Ar Ram, Qalandiya 21.06.04 p.m.Observers: Chava B., Noa E., Tova S. (reporting)Ar Ram. When we got to the checkpoint, we saw a crying father with a child . The father wanted to cross to bring his child for treatment at Hadassah hospital in Jerusalem. The father had an i.d. from the territories and the mother had an Israeli i.d. The father was taking the child because the mother was sick at home. We heard the border policemen try to get him a pass to cross. We got there at the end of these attempts and the crying man with the baby was refused permission to cross because he was forbidden entry by the shin bet. “That’s the way it is”, the soldiers explained. It is forbidden for hospitals in Israel to accept people without permits — even if the patient is 6 months old! Dahlia Bassa affirmed that the man should not be given permission to cross, as did Fares, although Fares said that if someone needs immediate care in a hospital, he would get it in a hospital — even without a permit. He did not deny that there is a regulation that hospitals not receive patients without permits. We checked this out with Physicians for Human Rights and they promised to clarify the issue. At Ar-Ram, there were few pedestrians and cars, so we continued to Qalandiya. At Qalandiya, there were few cars in the direction of Ramallah. Few peddlers and many transits. The engineering unit is still manning the checkpoint, together with the military police and two volunteers. There were a lot of pedestrians crossing through the checkpoint, and considering all the details of the inspection — body checks, check of bags and documents — it went quite quickly. On the north of the checkpoint, there is a large, colorful marketplace selling everything. At the edge of the wall, an observation tower was built that was even higher than the wall. We were told that on Sunday, a group of children climbed up the ladder when the soldiers weren’t there and threw burning tires into it. There were a lot of cars with nerve-wracked drivers waiting to cross from Ramallah. We asked why the checking was so slow and we were told that the border police had to do a thorough check (at the same time, the soldier went away to drink something, to talk with his friends, and for other diversions that only lengthened the time of the inspections). After repeated interventions, we succeeded in bringing about several changes at the checkpoint. They extended the shading in the direction of the soldiers’ position.