Beit Iba, Monday afternoon, 24.7.2006Observers: Yonah A. Ziona S. (reporting)Natanya translating.14.50 Checkpoint Jit. A checkpoint on road 60 from north to south but only 8 cars waiting.Beit Iba. Summary. 1. Limitations. No residents of Tubas and talusa can enter Nablus and no one between the ages of 16-35 can leave.2. The checking at the entrance to Nablus is much more strict than for those leaving. Even women of 60 have the last 4 numbers of their ids checked against the list.3. For the entire two hours that we were at the checkpoint in the scorching heat there was no water and both soldiers and detainees were completely dehydrated.15.00Many pedestrians in both directions. At the entrance to Nablus about 50 people are waiting. This is because at the entrance all are checked without exception of gender or age against the list with the last 4 numbers of their ids. Anyone whose number appears on the list is detained in the enclosure. But on the other hand the checking of those leaving Nablus is very quick. They do not check every detail. Women some with children in their arms pass without being checked. Elderly males pass in the humanitarian seciont with a quick look at the lists. The problem is that of families who have young children in their arms. The father has to hand over the child and then go back to the line of young men. The heat makes it hard for a mother to stand and wait when she has a child in her arms and a two year old at her side.There are 8 detainees in the enclosure. The commander asks us not to approach them as amongst them are two wanted men while two others are being detained as punishment. One of them is a bus driver who crosses the checkpoint on foot each day. The commander claims that yesterday he ran away and they decided to teach him a lesson.Amongst the detainees is a boy of 14 who came with his mother and younger brother and has been there an hour already. The mother is worried but the commander contends that they are checking against the population census of the secret service and he has no connection with them.15.50 A mother and two children in their teens or thereabouts 10 try to pass in the humanitarian line but the boys are sent to the ordinary line. A worried father passes in the line of the elderly and is waiting for his two teenaged sons to pass the turnstiles. He is worried because he has been waiting an hour already even the line is not long and he thinks something may have happened. We cannot check because there is no way we can get t them. 16.30 13 detainees in the enclosure but most of those detained about an hour ago have been freed within a few minutes. The bus driver and 14 year old are still there and the mother is very worried and tense. The commander claims that he cannot hurry things up and has to wait for a phonecall. He claims that there is no point in phoning the humanitarian centre because they have no connection with the institution of the census of the secret service.He promises us that he will free the bus driver after 3 hours.