Hawwara, Beit Furik, Thursday 29.9.2005 PMWatchers: Dorit H. Roni K. (reporting)Natanya translating Beit Furik. Usually quiet but the order of the morning that men under 30 cannot pass which continued until the late evening and even more paralyzed the life of those returning from work.Hawarra. A lessening of tension as a result of the cancellation of “the cancellation of life’ in the morning. Crossroads of Tapuach. “Segregation” …no passage from Tularkm and Jenin to Ramallah and not from Nablus to Ramallah. 14.30 Git crossroads -an army jeep parked the width of the road…checking two yellow taxis.14.40 At the turning to Yitzhar – (south of Hawarra). A temporary checkpoint…about 5 cars waiting.Hawarra – Very careful checking of belongings. The carousels are not connected to the electricity and therefore the passage through them seems a little bit more human. Relatively few cars in either direction. All bus passengers have to descend and their belongings are carefully checked by hand because the x-ray machines are not working. The buses going in are hardly checked but the drivers of the private cars have to step out of their cars and walk a distance to be questioned which leads to much anger and bitterness. 15.00 – On the way to the checkpoint people tell us that the problem is not the checkpoint itself but the border police who are present there, a couple of hundred metres to the north where there are many people. We ask the soldiers why this is so and they say that this is a different area, a different territory. At the checkpoint there are about 50 people waiting to get out and on the other side many people wanting to get into Nablus. Some of them are in holiday dress probably for Ramadan.15.10 – At the checkpoint of the cars are about five waiting because of a car with two important men inside. One of them is the mayor of Beit Ja’an east of Nablus. The car has been detained because neither of the men have a permit. A few moments of unpleasantness but the soldiers let them pass. In the other direction towards the exit passengers from a bus are checked for a fairly long period. Everyone has had to get out of the bus including women and children.15.20 – Behind the checkpoint at the entrance a humanitarian line is opened for a short period. 15.35 – We see two young detainees who are sent to the enclosure. The one has a cellphone with a picture of the Palestinian flag which evidently has broken the law about instigation. However luckily for him the DCO representative who was just leaving comes back at our request to free him …otherwise who knows how long he would have been kept there.15.45 – A bus passes without being checked.At the checkpoint itself there are few people and this is so for about an hour but the checking is very pedantic next to the x-ray machines but luckily the woman soldier sitting there is quiet and acts decently to everyone coming up to her …many women did not have to present their ids.N. an old acquaintance of Dorit’s who lives in Beit Ja’an comes to the checkpoint from Ramallah and tells us that the journey took about 55 minutess even though there were no other checkpoints on the way, except for Tapuach (for various reasons we went there at the end of our shift).16.15 – Another bus loaded with passengers passes without being checked.On the other hand the questioning of the drivers of private cars is very carefully done. In the following 15 minutes there were three such cases. Some dignitaries from Qalqiliya. The driver got out and walked to where the soldiers were standing…..at first they refused to let him pass but eventually , maybe because of our influence, they relented. The other case was an elderly woman who went to be questioned with a bitter look on her face. There was no problem and she was allowed to pass but was this really necessary. 16.20 – A young man whom the soldier accused of causing a disturbance was sent to the enclosure. He was very angry and restless. A conversation with him gave us the opinion that this was no delinquent but just a hot-headed young man. We say so to the soldiers but they say “Let him sit and learn.”At 16.30 we go to Beit Furik thinking that this punishment will not last long. But before we can do so we find ourselves in a bizarre situation….A family who has just left the checkpoint is laughing. It seems that the soldiers took a shirt from one of them, on which was printed the sign of the PLO. The soldiers say that this is against the laws of instigation and “he cannot walk around like that in the state.”This really has to be cleared but where in this world are these soldiers’ heads?Beit Furik 16.50-17.40 – We went to Beit Furik at the express wish of Micky F. so as to check out this order of this morning that only men over 30 can pass either way. This turned out to be a very definite order. Almost at once we found ourselves in a commotion of various kinds.The first was grotesque…the soldiers tried to stop a young man from passing with his wife and small son but in the end allowed them to go homeward. But as time passed we saw that this order was being carried out and in the end there were 7 men in the area of the checkpoint all wanting to go home after a day of work…in vain. And it got later and we asked what would be. One of the soldiers replied that they should go to an hotel, as if this is something that these people are familiar with. We left a message with Chanah B. and tried in vain to talk with the brigade. Only G. the spokesman, answered us but he could give us no answers even when we spoke to him later that night from home.17.45 – On the way back we had a general look at the checkpoint of Hawarra. Few cars or pedestrians but when we got there to our surprise we found the detainee….he was still there being “educated”. We spoke to S. who said he would free him.18.30 Crossroads of Tapuach – 30 cars from the north, waiting about an hour. No reply from the DCO