Hawara, Beit Furik. Tuesday, 3-2-2004,Watchers: Tami P (reporting)., Galit G., Taliah, Michal B. A cold and rainy day. At the Tapuah crossroads no presence of soldiers. Hawara, ‘as usual, closure, until further notice’, which means men of the ages 16 – 35 cannot pass without special permit. In general the flow of traffic was fairly normal. At the southern side a group of very amused soldiers, whose main amusement consisted of ‘small’ and unpleasant remarks between them about the passers-by. The atmosphere changed when a reserve officer joined, who was matter of fact and thinking, but the actual effect on the passage was slight (orders!).On the northern side there were constantly some 20-30 people but traffic moved and Ofer agreed often to let someone pass without demanding a permit from the DCO, which is very time-consuming as is well known.Since today is a holiday many who request to pass, do not succeed because of the constraint of age.At a certain stage a taxi arrived with a small girl who fell from the roof of her house. The taxi with the wounded girl and one relative passed quickly, but the other relatives who requested to get to the hospital in order to donate blood for her (she has a rare blood group O -) were not allowed to pass. Our appeal to doctors did not help. Families with children who came from Jerusalem, Ramallah, Qalqiliya and so on, who tried to celebrate with their families, did not succeed to pass. Some ten detainees jumped from one foot on the other in the cold hoping for a permit from the DCO or just to get their I.D. back. They had been waiting for two hours when we had to go back. The requests to the DCO and to the contact point resulted in up to four hours delay and ‘no case’. We drove to Beit Furik. The checkpoint was nearly completely deserted. We stayed for a while and we returned to see what became of the detainees in Hawara. Not surprisingly, they were still there waiting.As said before, we had to leave before their release.Tami P.