'Atarot, Al Jib (Givat Zeev), Jaba (Lil), Qalandiya, Thu 1.9.11, Afternoon

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Observers: 
Yael I., Orit Y. and Ilana D. (reporting)
Sep-1-2011
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Afternoon
From 2:00 till 4:30 PM

The last day of Id El Fitr

We walked into the sad neighborhood underneath Ramot which used to be part of Beit Iksa in the hope of meeting our young Hebrew speaking friend formerly from Abu Gosh. There is no more separate entrance to her part of the house and we met with her borther-in-law, the teacher and his mother, while she was inside with the babyinfo-icon and didn’t show herself. We remembered how she ‘dressed up’ modestly in front of other men when we visited with her. Since the men have cars, their main complaint at this time was the fact that the few people in their community are not allowed to make use of the Jib checkpoint in Givat Zeev like the inhabitants of  Nebi Samuel and Jib. They have to drive through Qalandia which sometimes takes two hours to reach their family members in Beit Iksa and sometimes they are not even allowed to visit them on foot, depending on the whims of the soldiers. They asked whether we could ‘do’ anything for them to facilitate their reaching schools and family. The Social Security issue has not been solved and their main fear at the moment is the fact that their little remaining land will be confiscated to accommodate the widening of the highway which will now, according to plans, run through their living room. As in the past, when they were finally granted blue Id’s, they have engaged Lea Tsemel to fight for them.

The Givat Zeev (Jib) CP was empty as usual.

Along the roads leading to Qalandia many cars were parked and we observed some happy family reunions with family members and children all dressed up. The line of cars entering the CP from the North was very long. It turns out that Palestinians from within Israel await their relatives from the West Bank who were lucky enough to obtain a permit for a holiday visit to Jerusalem, in order to take them for a ride to Jaffa or the beach. Unfortunately the wait at the CP takes two hours or more. We talked to the driver of a van who had to take a group of handball players to Tel Aviv for a match and had just been told that after a wait of 90 minutes it would take approximately another hour for the men to be able to exit. He was furious about the wasted time. After having found out that if we were to join the line we would have to wait for more than two hours to cross, we decided not to go into the CP and turned around. We inspected the new construction in Atarot and the landscaping along the beautiful roads. A sign at the entrance stated that people without a valid permit are not allowed to enter the industrial zone.