Huwwarra, Friday, 16.12.05,AMObservers: Ofra T, Nili P (reporting)Visitor: David N0900– on the way to Tapuah Junction, on the Trans Samaria Highway, fencing works along the roadside are proceeding apace. Larger areas are blocked off. Banners with Feiglin’s slogans for the Likud elections spread along the fences.Facing the village of Marda, on the left side of the road a Hummer sits waiting. Just before Tapuah Junction, on a dirt track, an army jeep waits for prey.0905 – at Tapuah, the checkpoint from the east is empty of vehicles. The position for those coming from the direction of Nablus is unmanned – no soldiers. A vehicle of the blue police is parked across the width of the road, holding up a Palestinian driver while the policemen write him a ticket. Sour faced police don’t answer our questions, state that we are interfering with them in their writing of the ticket. They do violunteer the information that there is no right turn to Ariel. They finish with the traffic ticket and head off to prey on traffic from Zaatra.As part of the extensive infrastructure works, a manned checkpoint is situated to the south.Before Yitzhar, a rolling checkpoint: a Hummer and road spikes.0925 Huwwara checkpoint- The fields around the checkpoint are blossoming with nylon bags. The garbage strewn along the fences and in the abandoned concrete building of the south checkpoint is offensive to the eye. The surroundings of the north checkpoint are not much better.Little traffic of people coming out of Nablus. There is closure, and the only ones allowed out are people who live in the nearby villages according to their identity cards.Three women with blue IDs are seeking to leave Nablus and return home to East Jerusalem. They say they attended a wedding in Nablus, and now they’re going home. The soldier checking papers won’t let them pass. Another soldier arrives during the shift, and he is at least impatient – if not crude. He forbids the women to pass, though they do not live in Nablus: “Yalla, yalla, you are not going through.”We phone the Nablus DCO and leave a voice message for G., the brigade spokesman. The DCO clerk asks to talk to the checkpoint commander, and – lo and behold – the women are allowed to return to Jerusalem. According to the commander, the order was changed because of a warning of the danger of kidnapping of Israeli citizens in Nablus. Suddenly they care about women from East Jerusalem…The Palestinians seeking to leave Nablus are sent back, but not before examination of their bags and baggage, and some are even asked to lift their clothes.Those who pass through the checks between the two turnstiles reach another check station at which their papers are examined – and then they are sent back, because there is no exit for Nablus residents. We ask the commander is asked why their belongings and bodies are being examined if they are not going to be allowed to leave, why they aren’t sent back before the examination? He delivers a lecture: “If someone has a knife – he’s dangerous.” It almost sounds logical, but then if he really has a knife, why send him back to Nablus with the knife?A tourist from Chicago, whose wife, so he says, lives in Nablus, asks to go through with a car with Israeli number plates. He is forbidden to take the car through, because he does not have the appropriate document. All his attempts to persuade the soldiers are without avail.0945 – a bus with youth, and their escorts, who have been invited to a conference on Aids in Ramallah, is not allowed to leave Nablus because there was no prior coordination. The bus waits on the northern side while attempts are made to coordinate the transit. The passengers have to send a list by fax to the DCO in order to get a permit. And where are they going to find a fax at the checkpoint?10;10 – a growing line of some thirty Palestinians. A military policewoman is checking the men while a soldier stands guard with his weapon pointed at the line.A family – parents, a child of four, one of nine and another of 16 – want to pass through to the village of Inbus where they live. The 16 year old is listed in his ID as living in Nablus, and the soldiers will not let him leave. The short tempered soldier says to the father “Get away from here, either way – but not here!” The father, carrying his four year old, together with the child of nine, leaves the checkpoint in the direction of his village. The mother, refusing to leave her son, remains at the checkpoint, refusing to move. The boy is driven away to the north side. The mother tries time and again to explain in Arabic to the soldiers that the boy lives with them in the village, not in Nablus, but it is hopeless.1030 – pouring rain. There is no shelter from it because of the driving wind. Freezing cold. And the Palestinians, with their children and babies in arms, walk in the rain, stand in the rain…The mother tries to persuade the checkpoint commander to let the boy pass. The answer: “No one passes! Closure!” Nevertheless, he checks on the ID through his Motorola. But he doesn’t allow passage. According to the soldiers, if the boy was one year younger, he would be allowed through…1050 – a Palestinian man between the turnstiles is being examined by the policewoman who is ordering him to lift his clothes and expose his body.1100 – An older man who knows the family from Inbus arrives at the checkpoint. He testifies that the boy registered as living in Nablus lives with his family and studies in the village. He phones an acquaintance in Taayush to try and help. He speaks Hebrew and explains the situation to us. We phone the DCO and the brigade spokesman and explain the obstinacy of the soldiers, who are refusing to let the boy go with his family to Inbus. The DCO asks for details of the ID and for those of his parents. We pass the data on, and the boy is allowed through. The mother thanks us.A DCO representative arrives to collect the IDs of the bus passengers who want to go to the Ramallah conference. He is dealing with the matter, and since obviously it is only a matter of a short while before the bus will be on its way, we leave.At the south checkpoint, a border police jeep is now standing crosswise on the road, but the policemen are not getting out.Five cars are waiting at the Yitzhar rolling checkpoint.