Beit Iba 11/02/04 Wednesday afternoon Rutie K, Mickey S., Zela L., Ada R., Adna K., Deborah L.(Reporting) 12:30 Stopped at Ram Tiba a small village near Qalqiliya to see if we could help. They are surrounded by the fence . Similar story to Jubara. A tunnel is being built under the main road 55 for them to go to Qalqiliya. They are considered to be on the Israeli side and they have permits for 6 months. The fence separates them from some of their land. We were told that the gate is opened 3 times a day. Nothing we can do. There is not checkpoint or army there. 12:45 Car problems so we went to a village between Qalqiliya and Azun on route 55 to repair the car. While there we heard that Qalqiliya was closed. The mechanic who was supposed to bring the part from there was stuck at the checkpoint. On the way back from Beit Iba we stopped at Qalqiliya(about 5:00) and it was open. 2:15 Car fixed headed toward Beit Iba but stopped at Azun because we saw a crowded checkpoint. There were 2 jeeps and about 6 soldiers. Traffic was stopped going in and out. ID’s brought to the soldier in one of the jeeps. He didn’t call the numbers in just took a good look at them and asked some questions and let them go. Students coming from Beit Iba were allowed to pass without a problem. We didn’t get an answer as to why the checkpoint was suddenly in existence. They seemed to be looking for someone in particular. 2:50 Beit Eba-There was no line going in to Nablus but a long one leaving. When we went to see what was going on it just seemed the people were hesitant to move closer to the checkpoint since no one was motioning them on. We kind of encouraged them to step closer and then it all moved fast. There did seem to be enough soldiers on duty but they would get caught up talking to each other or not noticing the long line. There were about 20 detainees some of whom claimed they were there from 9am. Some had been caught trying to go around others were just going through the normal check. They were nervous and cold and all seemed to have been waiting at least 2 hours. We couldn’t get a really clear picture of what the stories were. Some of the IDs came trickling back . There was strange incident that was particularly disturbing so for those who are interested, I’ll go into some detail. A young man who did not have an ID who said it had been taken from him in Nablus wanted to go through with a copy of his birth certificate. He was not being particularly friendly to the soldiers so he was pushed to the side in a kind of cement alcove. There was something unusual about the man and we felt he might not be totally normal. We kept a watch on what they might do with him. While he was being checked out the soldiers would come up to him and he would be impatient or sometimes joke and there was a kind of weird banter going on between him and the soldiers. At one point they discovered , or he showed them, a drawing he had on him. It showed greater Israel with wires being pulled by 2 fists and some guns over it. Kind of a childish colored sketch. This got the soldiers really upset so they called the officer in charge and he also got shook up over the drawing. As a result the man’s hands were tied behind him and a covering put over his eyes. We didn’t know what to do. The soldiers felt justified in binding him. They did not beat him or handle him roughly. This got all of their attention focused on him and so the trucks coming into Scham started to line up. By this time they were all really tired of us since we had nagged them about the detainees and then about the man tied up and they couldn’t understand why we didn’t see that they were protecting us. Sami suggested we leave. It was cold and getting dark so we did . On the way home we called one of the detainees and we were told they had been released. We don’t know what happened to the man who was bound up. (Deborah)