Qalandiya, Tuesday, 22.11.05, PM Observers: Norah O., Iris B., Roni H. (reporting)15:00 – 16:00 French Hill junctionIn order to watch over the 4 Palestinian peddlar children, who are being regularly harrassed by the police, we stopped over at the French Hill junction. 10 minutes later a police car (32 504) arrived, pulled up at the traffic island and took control of the junction. At this very moment the children interrupted selling their chewing gum and the 2 small ones (8 – 10 years) ran away to position themselves at the next junction (nearer to French Hill neighborhood). The 2 older children told us that they knew the police man very well, because he has caught them several times at this place and has driven them to the Youth Department of the Jerusalem police, where they were mistreated by other police men. While the car was parked at the junction, the boys did not dare to sell their meager goods. However, one of the police men did not feel it was beneath his dignity to search behind stacks to “discover” the hiding place of the children’s “merchandise”. At about 15:50 the 2 older boys had enough of the inactivity imposed upon them and went to join their brothers at the next junction. The policemen decided that there was no reason anymore to “defend” the junction against the “undermining” activity of the peddlars and left. The children came back and when we returned at 19:30 they were still there! The separation of Bir Naballah from Ar-Ram and Jerusalem is almost complete!On the way to Qalandiya we noticed that the opening in the wall at Ar-Ram junction was blocked for cars and pedestrians. This means that the population has no other way to leave their enclave, but towards north, direction Ramallah! There is still one narrow sideway left for getting to Ar-Ram checkpoint, but this will be blocked very soon as well! The masterplan of isolating East Jerusalem from its periphery and turning the suburbs into enclaves is in full swing!!16:45 QalandiyaThe checkpoint is drowning in mud! There is no way to avoid the deep puddles of rainwater! The checking area for the cars is the end of an endless traffic jam in 2 directions and from the position of the soldiers one could see, of course, the total traffic chaos within the built up area on the main road to Ramallah! But who cares! Our great concern was that an ambulance might turn up. While we were present this ultimate catastrophe did not happen – but what about the rest of the days? It is completely irresponsible to create an additional bottleneck without providing for an adequate solution for the first bottleneck in the built up area of Qalandiya camp!