Translator:  Charles K.

Meitar crossing

Despite the complaints, by 6:45 the fenced corridor is empty.  All the laborers have crossed to the Israeli side. Two buses carrying relatives of prisoners wait on the Palestinian side.

We agreed to come again next week, at 4:30 in the morning, to see what goes on before 6:30.

Route 60

Heavy traffic, vehicles of all kinds. A jeep apparently outfitted with surveillance devices covering a broader area is parked at the Eshtamoa settlement. We hear the buzz of an unmanned drone in the sky. There’s also an observation balloon.

At the Dura Elfawwar junction there’s a flying checkpoint! A spiked barrier and soldiers who’ve come down from the pillbox and search the cars entering and leaving Elfawwar. When we return, they’re no longer there.

Razor wire glints in the sun below Beit Haggai. There’s also a roadblock at the southern entrance to Hebron. Soldiers are inspecting a car they’ve detained. A soldier on the hill, weapon drawn, covers them.

Kvasim junction– A busy sheep market before the holiday. There, too, soldiers on guard as they are every week. In view of their responses in previous weeks, we decided not to ask them why they’re interfering with the daily life of the people.  It would only depress us.

Hebron

The new entrance being built to Kiryat Araba and the finishing touches to the 144 housing units in Nofei Mamreh are very impressive and make us envious. For that, there’s money, and lots of it.

Soldiers are everywhere in town.  Around the Worshippers Route – soldiers.  At Curve 160 – soldiers.

At the Pharmacy checkpoint the school janitor says everything is ok, and there aren’t any particular problems. Suddenly two soldiers and an officer from the Lavie battalion show up, in addition to the soldiers at the checkpoint.

We ask the CPT women about the atmosphere at the checkpoint. They’re happy to report that those soldiers came and talked to the ones at the checkpoint, and then they stopped searching the children’s schoolbags.

They said they spoke to the soldiers, who told them they’d inspect the bags of only 1 in 10 children, for security reasons, of course. Perhaps someone’s reading the reports of all the organizations, and taking them seriously!? Because a minute ago, and in previous days, they treated every compass and ruler as if it had been a weapon.

We tried to find a member of Osama abu Sharach’s family, to ask how they are.  Everything was still closed.  We were told he’s renovating his home, and he’ll move back in when the renovations have been completed.

In general, we’re happy to see that Palestinians are renovating homes in the entire area surrounding the Cave of the Partriarchs. 

I keep remembering the verse, “But the more they afflicted them, the more they multiplied and the more they spread abroad” (Exodus 1:12).  Isn’t that written in our own sources?!  Shouldn’t we have learned to be smarter, more humane, more understanding?!  Meanwhile, this whole city is filled with people who’ve selected entirely different verses to guide their lives.