Qalandiya, Bir Naballa, Sunday, 22 April, p.m. Observers: Netanya G, Phyllis W, Lizi S, Tamar F (reporting)The eve of Memorial Day for Israel’s fallen soldiersQalandiya, checkpointWhen we arrived, there were two inspection lanes functioning. The passage to the DCL was locked and a soldier there told those asking to get to the office that it was closed. From a distance, we were able to see that in the waiting hut, there were some people and that there were still people going in to the offices, but that observation did not persuade the soldier who was operating the button allowing entrance. A few minutes later, Sergeant Abu R, the DCL representative (telephone 0509839027) arrived and ordered that the turnstile be opened.At 4:00, there was an electrical outage throughout the checkpoint. The people who found themselves stuck in the passage lane could not go back. The commander of the unit at the passages, Daniel (telephone 0578194024) started to check the people and their i.d.’s without any special mechanisms and allowed them to cross via the gate. When we went over to the checkpoint for vehicles, we saw that because of the electrical blackout, the turnstiles leading from Jerusalem northward were locked and a large group of people were crowded in front of the passageway and were pressing on the intercom button and not getting any answer. Only a round of telephone calls by us got Daniel to come to the area and free up the passageway with a look of anger on his face. At 4:30, we met Abu N’, a resident of Gaza, who had just returned from Jordan with his daughter, via the Allenby Bridge. The daughter had undergone eye surgery in Jordan and the two of them requested a permit to continue on their way to Gaza. Because the DCL office was closed, they needed our help. Lizi called the humanitarian hotline and they passed her on to the DCL of Gaza, who passed her on to authorities in Judea and Samaria, who passed her on to the DCL of the Jerusalem envelope, i.e. Qalandiya who returned her to the humanitarian hotline who turned her again to the DCL of Qalandiya. I also joined in this “Had Gadya” of the Hagaddah of Independence Day and called Shaadi who, as usual, did not answer. I then called Kobi who answered but got back to me after a few minutes and said that they were in an inservice training meeting — why the need for so many of these meetings? — I called the office of the civil authority and there a young man, who refused to identify himself said that the father and daughter should come tomorrow and then hung up the phone. I called Tzidki M’ who asked me to pass on the information about the two people and promised to deal with the matter and let me know how it was progressing. He did indeed get back to me and told me about the progress and asked that we be patient. But at 6:00, apparently at the end of the working day he disappeared and there was no way to get in touch with him. . . . Lizi then called a soldier by the name of Hussam in the DCL of the Jerusalem envelope. He was very empathetic, and I was in contact with Tzidki. We waited in the line with the father and daughter and the driver, who had brought them there and had been with them all day while they waited to get the permit. The little girl sat in the car the whole time.At 5:15, the father was called into the DCL office and we waited outside because we were not allowed to accompany him. We waited a long time, and at one point, Daniel arrived and asked in a quiet, provocative voice asked if this is all that we had to do on a day like this and had we no memorial services to attend. In the same tone, I replied that at this time I opted to deal with the living and not with the dead. A short time later, a group of soldiers came to us , including a woman soldier who in the past had pointed her rifle at Lizzie, and shouted to Daniel. Why don’t you get rid of them At 6:10, The father returned to us without a permit. He was told that the computers crashed and that he must go to the DCL in Ramallah. Lizie checked things out with Husam who promised that the man would get the permit today and that they would be able to cross the Erez checkpoint. Father and daughter went to the Ramallah DCL and we exchanged telephone numbers Phyllis and Netanya were, this whole time, watching over what was going on in lane one. They met a nurse who works in East Jerusalem who was returning from inservice training in Ramallah. When she got to the checkpoint this morning, she realized that while she was hurrying to leave the dorms of the medical institution, she took the wrong bag which did not have her i.d. and she only had an employee’s certificate indicating that she was a nurse. Phyllis suggested that she call her roommate, but she was on holiday. Phyllis called the humanitarian hotline and there they checked her out according to her i.d. number and other details and within 20 minutes, she was allowed to pass into Jerusalem.