Bethlehem and surroundings, Tuesday, 4.4.2006, MorningObservers: Judith A. Tamar A. (reporting) Man Hunting (6:15 – 8:15):At the end of the road going down from Nuaman to Um-Tuba only a few workers are waiting for the contractors’ transport. On the hill in the middle of the road between Um-Tuba and Noaman about 20-30 workers turn back to Nuaman, some of them running away. One worker came towards us and asked if we saw soldiers. We did not see. The next worker pointed towards the hill and said “police”. A few minutes later a lone BP man appeared from Har-Homa direction, a gun in his hand, climbing the hill. He reported on the cellular radio that he was “on the hill to the right of Um-Tuba”. The workers kept on running and managed to disappear on the other side of the hill. From the Nuaman direction came a BP jeep – removing the blocks on the way made it very easy for the jeeps in their search for illegal aliens – apparently in order to pick up the lone policeman, but he already disappeared behind the hill, and the jeep went back to Nuaman. As we went on we saw again the lone BP man. We climbed up to see if he succeeded in catching some people. We went back to the main road and saw another BP man and a woman soldier checking the people going towards Jerusalem. Three children on their way to school were forced to go near the soldiers clung to the other side of the narrow path in order to get as far as possible from the two. We met parents escorting their children to school who usually greet us with a smile. That morning they were so tense and freighted that they hardly said “good morning”. The jeep was still in the village. The hunting-policeman arrived too. He went down to the village homes, went through one of the courtyards where he continued looking for illegal aliens. He climbed onto the jeep and disappeared with it in the direction of Al-Has. The jeep accelerated and made a lot of noise. In front of one of the courtyards a few children on their way to school were standing. The BP presence scared them, and only after the jeep disappeared they went with us towards the El-Has passage. So did a few of the workers who managed to hide in the courtyards. Another BP jeep stood by the southern homes of Nuaman. Fields separated between the southern side of Nuaman and the main road. Going down to the passage we saw a picture of continuous distruction of nature for the purpose of building Mizmoria CP. A few weeks ago it was a slope full of olive trees, now it turned into a flat area, 100 meters wide. At the bottom a BP jeep was standing, on the way up to El-Has a few workers were still waiting hoping in vain that maybe they will succeed to sneak to their work-place. Four workers, who’s ID cards were taken, probably by the BP, arrived to the jeep and waited to be released. Three-four other workers, who were not caught, were waiting behind us under an almond tree for a chance to go back peacefully to El-Has. When they realized that the jeep had no intention of moving, they started going down a few tens of meters away from it. One lifted his hands to heaven – maybe salvation will come from Allah. They succeeded to cross the security-road and climbed and got to the other side near the cemetery. The BP were busy with detainees, while two of them went in El-Has direction and came back without additional detainees. At exactly 7:15 the construction work began. The digger (a long orange arm with a small spoon and strong teeth) standing on the flat area, approaching what was still left of the hill. The arm lifted up, the teeth caught another piece of land and in no time it was gone. We stood at a distance at about 10 meters and the land underneath us was shaking. A short yellow digger with a big spoon collected the fallen earth and evacuated it. We left before the digger’s teeth will catch us too by mistake. Near the site of destruction we met our acquaintance A.I., the security man (who on Thursday attacked Dror Atkas). He asked how we felt and we said “pretty bad”. “Yes, this is the destruction of the hill, I agree”, he said and continued with the eternal justification of everybody who works for a conquering power: “we don’t make the descisions, we just execute them”. He had a small comfort for us: “the almond trees will stay”. He looked at our badge “women for human rights”. “I have not yet seen a good person”, he said “they are beasts”. On our way back between Nuaman and Um-Tuba there were no BP and no workers trying to cross. From Har-Homa we heard the sound of the diggers’ continue in the building the neighborhood – Nuaman is located between two construction sites; each day the construction sites get closer to the village. In the afternoon I got a message that there was no water in Nuaman for 3 days, because during the work on the CP the water pipe from El-Has had been disconnected. I tried to call different people. The offices are not famliar with the village of Nuaman and the IDF name for the checkpoint: Mizmoria. I had to explain where the place was. From BP office in Jerusalem informed me that they already have water in Nuaman, and that the disconnection was not related to the constuction work there. Later I heard from the “humanitarian center” (Hamoked), that the contractor was indeed responsible for the water disconnection, they were now working on repair, and within one hour they should have water. In the evening I called Y. and he confirmed that the water were back. He also told me that the illegal aliens-hunter, whom we saw in the morning, was a daily visitor.