Abu-Dis, Sheikh Saed, Zeitim CPTuesday, 26.09.2006, AmObservers: Natanya G., Nava E. (reporter)Sheikh Saed: 06:40 – School children, young men, pass without any problem. Uphill, at the wide corner, about 8 young men are reclining on a wall. When we asked the soldier what happens with them he suggested that we climb up and ask – and we accepted his offer. All of them are inhabitants of sheikh Saed, and they arrive every morning hoping to pass the checkpoint and get to work. One of them, a father of 13 said emphatically: “I don’t have go get to Jerusalem. The work is here, in Jabel Mukaber. I am glad when they let me pass even one day a week.”From the hilltop one can see a similar hill, on the south, that seems to be separated from the main village. The people tell us that this is Jabel Monter that was part of Zur Bahr, and was separated from it by the bureaucracy wall. But, one of the men added, they are lucky. They have a road and they go to Beitlehem. Another man thinks that they will not be separated from Zur Bahr because they won the case in court. It is not clear which story is true.The inhabitants tell us that during the last few weeks the army (or the police) come to their homes at 01:00 at night, and break into them “they break open the door if we do not open it immediately…” they collect the IDs of the people in the apartment, including the blue ones, write down their details, and also the details of the small children who stay in the apartment and leave. The inhabitants cannot explain what is the meaning of this nocturnal breaking-in. I think that the state prepares mapping of who lives where and will probably use the information in the future. Maybe it will be used to take away the blue IDs, since Sheikh Saed was defined here as an “out-of-Jerusalem” neighborhood. Maybe the state tries to have better stand in the Supreme Court, claiming that the inhabitants are actually inhabitants of the occupied territories, and maybe there is some other purpose.Abu-Dis: 07:20 – It is quiet and deserted. We took the car for a test drive along the decorative wall. After we passed three houses we came upon rolled barbed wire, and behind it two guards sitting on a balcony in the shade. Natanya tried to find out what the blockage is all about, but they did not want to answer us or talk about.Zeitim CP: 07:40 – A quick passage. We took time – three minutes. The traffic from the direction of El Ezariya is scarce, but steady. No one tried to pass in the opposite direction. The blue taxis, number 63 and 36 filled up slowly and went on their way.The container: 08:00 – One bus and about eight big vans were waiting aside for the documents that were being checked. The passengers were allowed to stay out of the taxis. The grocery store was closed because of Ramadan. Six out of the eight taxis were sent on their way within fifteen minutes after we arrived.On the window of the bus there was a sign in English and in Arabic explaining that the passengers are family members of people arrested in Ofer Camp, and they are on their way to visit the prisoners under the protection of the Red Cross. In the bus there were many young women with nursing babies. The bus passed the checkpoint without any problem, but then the driver made a mistake that deserved a special educational punishment. He saw that the short road that goes beside the grocery store, straight into the wadi, is open (usually it is closed by an iron bar). The driver started moving towards the forbidden road and was stopped by the soldiers. He was told that the punishment would be a delay of everyone until 12:00 in the afternoon.Sylvia answered us, called the center that informed the Abu-Dis DCO. Ten minutes later the bus driver got permission to go away – only on the permitted, long road. This was a quick treatment by everyone involved. Maybe the emphasize on the nursing babies that were crying all the time helped…