Za’atra, Huwwara, Beit Furiq 21 January 2006 Watchers: Michal P., Eilat B.The Israel Police Force is responsible for the security of the Palestinians.Beit Furiq opens in the morning at 8:00 a.m. and closes in the evening at 5:30 p.m.The Border Police settled in at the entrance to the Huwwara south roadblock and caused jams and a build up of hundreds of vehicles.Za’atra9:40 a.m.From the west – there are a lot of vehicles of all descriptions. There are two parallel lanes for checking. Everyone is checked, everyone crosses.A police patrol car checks all the I.D. cards of bus passengers after the soldiers have checked them. When we ask why they reply that they are ‘responsible’ for the well being of ‘eevereeyone’ and they are searching for ‘criminal offenders’ and ‘traffic and insurance offenders’. For this reason buses are held up for about a half an hour at the roadblock. A woman who alighted from the bus because she wanted to walk to the road leading to Salfit from the junction was warned that it is not permitted to cross the roadblock on foot only in vehicles.From the north – as above with three checking lanes. The patrol car arrives here too and the same process takes place. The Israel Police Force is very responsible and is concerned for the well being of the citizens, even if they are not citizens.The average pace of checking the cars travelling south is a car a minute.In front of Yitzhar Junction10:20 a.m.From the south there is a flying roadblock without queues or detainees.Huwwara10:28 a.m.There are some sixty people waiting in two queues for two turnstiles. One queue is for young men; the second queue is for everyone else. Behind the first queue for the turnstile, facing four rifle muzzles, the queue is combined into one to cross the only working turnstile before the document checkpoint.There are no detainees. No vehicles are waiting to enter. We could not see how many vehicles were waiting to exit; according to Rafael there are fifteen.There are many people crossing all the time in both directions.We saw two ambulances meeting opposite Huwwara south. We went to see what was happening and it appears that a patient from Hebron is being brought to be hospitalised in Nablus and, in order to save time, detours and roadblocks, the patient is being transferred ‘back to back’ into an ambulance from Nablus.11:00 a.m.The pedestrian queue has shortened slightly and there is now a queue of about seven vehicles to enter Nablus.A beggar on the pavement between the south and the north has brought a young child, aged 3 or 4, to work with her.Nadim reports long queues at the flying roadblock near Yitzhar and we are on our way there.At Huwwara south two jeeps belonging to the Border Police have settled in and we go to see what is happening: “my soldiers have come to ‘ensure that the road is clean’”. Just like the blue police at Za’atra they have come to look after and guard the Palestinians walking through the roadblock so that they go via the stalls and not on the road. (What does three falafels mean in the police force?) A conversation develops with the police until a third jeep arrives and a ‘three falafels’ gives out orders.Yitzhar JunctionThe ‘road is clean’ (there are no queues) and we return in the direction of Beit Furiq.The Border Police are still ‘cleaning the road at Huwwara south. As things continue, in about an hour, we will witness the embodiment of the ‘cleaning’.Beit Furiq11:40 a.m. There are no vehicles waiting. The roadblock commander: “you can cross; you can’t cross… the normal routine”.Few pedestrians cross in both directions.We go to the taxis. The drivers tell us that in the last few days the roadblock is opened at 8:00 a.m., people in a hurry who cross the roadblock before it opens are warned off by shots fired in the air.In the evening the roadblock is closed at 5:30 p.m. in both directions. Sometimes people are allowed to leave Nablus up to 6:00 p.m.Last Thursday, immediately after the suicide bombing in Tel Aviv the roadblock did not completely close but the crossing was very slow and there was a build up of hundreds of people who wanted to leave and a few youngsters by-passed the roadblock on foot. When they got to the field by the taxi car park a Hammer jeep arrived. Six of them were arrested, taken to the roadblock where they were beaten and detained for several hours. They were released at 8:00 p.m. I have the telephone number of the driver who reported this to me and he will try and identify one of those beaten up whom he knows.Hagar and Racheli are reporting and they are on their way to Beit Furiq now.Awarta12.18 p.m.The roadblock is closed.Huwwara12:20 p.m. Our colleages Tami G., and Aya K., are here.80 people are waiting to enter. There are no detainees and the crossing is relatively quick.A man who came through just now reports that today he ‘only’ waited a quarter of an hour and that is ‘due to us’ because on previous days the wait took up to three hours… all of my denials did not help… but at any rate it was an interesting ‘grade’ compared to our usual ‘what are we doing here anyway if we can’t help with anything’…Some thoughts: in spite of our almost permanent presence at the roadblock I often meet Palestinians who are very surprised to find out that we are Jews from Israel and they are quite confused and doubtful and really don’t know how to take it… the truth is that I don’t know either. Who are we? We wander around freely, without arms and uniforms, without head coverings, speaking Hebrew with the soldiers and staring at them: in the queues, when they lift their shirts and remove their belts, when they walk around loaded down with parcels and children… it is so vague… so ambiguous…The main road, the southern entrance, in front of the car parks.12:30 p.m.It is jammed and blocked by hundreds of vehicles of every description in every direction.Because of observing the holiness of Shabbat, there are no settlers’ vehicles on the road and the Palestinians can be abused without harming the right-of-way of the Jews, who might run into the jams on weekdays.The cause: who, if not our friends the Border Police ‘the road cleaners’… I contact Nevuani – there is no reply. Gil – no reply. Naomi Lalo – I can’t get her. Ditto Aya K., who is at the northern roadblock.Since in my stupidity we did not stay there but continued on our way home – by the time I reached Naomi she said that there was nothing she could do. I admit it and will be forgiven for leaving (what does that mean anyway?).