06:30 AM, Bethlehem CP: One of those rare miraculous morning, where every thing is functioning as it should, no crowding both sides, no long waiting in line (except, of course, for those who arrive as early as 04:00, and before, so as to be at the head of the line when the CP opens at 05:00). And the question addressed to us repeatedly was: if this CP can function more or less “normally”, why does it happen so rarely; to which we had no answer.

08:00 AM,  Etzion DCL: About one hundred people. An irate man approaches us: it’s the fourth consecutive morning that he comes to the DCL and cannot get in. The DCL commander refuses categorically, the man says, to give people numbers based on the list of names that Palestinians prepare on arrival, so that when the DCL opens, people fight to get to the head of the line and, of course, the strongest prevail. To our question, the commander explained that those are the orders he has. Otherwise, he said, he spends the night chasing away people who intend to stay in the parking lot in front of the DCL, just so that they can be the first to enter the DCL when it opens. Not distributing anymore numbers according to the time of arrival, he says, will educate the people not to come too early. So once more, the army comes out with a “didactic” solution at the expense of Palestinians.