Hebron, Sansana (Meitar Crossing), South Hebron Hills, Sun 16.6.13, Morning
Translator: Charles K.
06:00 Meitar-Sansana crossing
A long line of cars at the entrance wait to transport workers to their jobs, and many people without Israeli work permits run down the slopes to the vehicles. The owners of the stalls and the ecumenicals both tell us that the checkpoint opened at 03:45 today, to everyone’s joy. Rumor had it that “the boss” is at the checkpoint and everyone’s trying to please him. Later we learned it was only a rumor.
06:16 I telephone the checkpoint manager and must have caught him at home. On the Palestinian side we meet a man who, on Thursday, 13.6.13, lost all his documents on the Israeli side and now, since he has no documents, can’t cross to search for them, must less go through. I talk to the checkpoint manager while standing alongside the man. And though it’s not his shift, he promises to check whether the documents might have been found. And, as he promised, he calls back in a few minutes. Unfortunately, they’re not there, but he promises that when he comes later in the day he’ll also check the video cameras. He asks for more information, the time the man returned that day, and asks me to keep the person’s contact information so he can be located if the documents are found. At the end of the conversation he asks me whether the lines at Tarqumiyya are really so long and the situation as bad as Amira Hass described in her article. All I could do was confirm what she wrote, and that’d we be glad if he taught his counterpart at Tarqumiyya how to work and treat people.
How the bureaucracy operates: A young man who had been released on bail approached us; he has to serve time in Israel but can’t enter because his documents remained in Israel and according to the computer he’s forbidden to enter.
We left after giving two people the phone numbers of Chaya Ofek and Sylvia.
Southern Hebron Hills
Ma’on junction – a military vehicle provides security for people at the bus stop.
Construction continues at Eshtamoa; a large group of guests is getting some kind of explanation next to the new construction.
Hebron
Two military jeeps block the section of the worshippers route leading up to Kiryat Arba. No detainees
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Nobody even looks at us at the entrance to the Cave of the Patriarchs. A short trip through Hebron, there’s no school and the soldiers appear to be unemployed.