Deif Sharaf, Beit Iba

Deif Sharaf, Beit Iba Sunday 6.08.06 PM Observers: Alex W, Susan L (reporting)Guest: Shari M. SummaryThings are bad in the Occupied West Bank, life is made ever harder for the Palestinians: at Beit Iba the checkpoint was closed yesterday for six hours, so it's weird and wonderful that they're now concerned about us: "Haifa? And how is it for you?" 13:30 On the way to Deir SharafNo hold up at Jit Junction, just three soldiers standing at the eastern side of the rolling checkpoint that isn't. On the other hand, there is a rolling checkpoint at the Qedumim gas "station", more correctly "pump" opposite Qedumim's industrial area. We greet the surly soldiers with a "shalom," and are immediately challenged as to whether there will, indeed, be peace. There are 14 vehicles in line, an Egged bus (empty, as usual, speeding by the checkpoint), a truck bearing grapes, taxis , private cars, etc., but the checking is quick, two soldiers in an air conditioned Hummer and two outside moving everything quite quickly although bags in the back of taxis are ordered opened. 14:10 Beit IbaWe hear about the Saturday closing of the checkpoint a day earlier from the Huwwash Bros., that there's lots of work (complete kitchens and bedroom furniture impressively visible), but that work from Israel is on hold at present, "Not now." 14:25 A lone broom stands across one of the covered walkways, but its function is not clear: certainly the filth is a great as ever, certainly it's not another makeshift barricade. It would be nice to feel that a new broom has been brought in, a new leader, or even commander, one with a new perspective to bring about change at this awful checkpoint. Not so here, or anywhere else. Here, as all over the Occupied Territories, it's still an old broom, not even dusting the usual corners but reinforcing the dirt that's already there….Not a great number of pedestrians passing to or from Nablus, but the humanitarian line is open, making life a little easier. Five soldiers are in the soldier's compound, outside the checkpost, lounging lethargically although one shows enough energy to ask: "Why don't you help soldiers fighting the war?" They check exceedingly slowly, making sure to go through an Arabic newspaper, of which we know they understand not a word, or flicking through a student's notebook. One jocular pedestrian shows his ID, then asks, laughingly, "And now I go over there?" (nodding to the detention compound). The soldiers are not amused. 14:30 -- in the detention compound, five young men, one of whom, neither Hebrew nor English speaking, is asked whether he had spent time in prison (the Hebrew word for "prison" he understands. A couple of weeks. A soldier now enters the detention compound, and stays there, midst the young men. It is clear his mates are worried about him, but all is relieved, literally, by a change in shift. 14:35 -- E., the second lieutenant, who's the checkpoint commander, stands checking at the humanitarian line, chatting with the passersby. When he finally wanders over to the main checking area, he goes through the detainees: one stole a car, one spoke "badly" to the soldiers the day before (when the checkpoint was closed for hours and hours). So, today, in the army's inimitable logic, he has to be punished. There's a bicycle, belonging to one of the detainees (a rarity of a sight at checkpoints) propped in the way of those who pass by the checking post. It falls, it brushes up against people, and a soldier tells us, "It's not ours," and people continue to be bothered by it until it's removed (by us), put into the shade by the side of the detention compound where the detainee owner nods his thanks. 15:00 -- there are less vehicles than usual when we arrive: none at all going into Nablus, when we leave, six into the city, three leaving, including a semitrailer with pipes, one tanker from Qusin. The donkey carts, too, are carrying pipes today, making one wonder if our hopes for the end to the occupation, or any kind of peace are in fact pipe dreams – as unrealistic as they are impractical. The vehicle checking is the unfriendly sort: a gun pointed at passengers in a bus while another soldier goes through and checks IDs, even UN IDs thoroughly checked. 16:00 -- a welcome "barricade" a large herd of goats and sheep, two shepherds at the junction with the settlement up the hill. There, the olive trees where the so-called new security road below Shavei Shomron is being built, are dying on the side: Jamal, the mini market owner no longer goes up there to visit what has been destroyed, taken from his family. At the military tower at the top of the hill, a lone soldier descends and demands to know if he can help us, but to our question as to why the road is being widened to such an extent, he replies that he's no idea. To us, there's little doubt that the occupation is, once again, being reinvented, to the detriment of the Palestinians. Note: Both at Jamal's mini market and at the kiosk at the checkpoint, the news, from Al Jazeera, which is not usually listened to, is on. We hear more about the horrendous "closure" of the day before, people struggling to get to their homes, beyond the checkpoint, around midnight, across the razor wire encircled fields. (And we first hear of Kfar Giladi in Deir Sharaf too).