Beit Iba

Beit Iba, Sunday 21.01.07 PM Observers: Aliya S., Alix W., Susan L. (reporting)Summary : It’s high time to talk about lying, the great art (or is it a science) which is practiced daily by the army or by the government in the Occupied West Bank to sell its so called policy to the rest of the world. It’s time to stop talking about a euphemism like “hot warning.” It’s time to confront the daily drumbeat of deceptive public relations strategies. It’s time to call what’s going on as lies, lies, all lies. The road from Qalqiliya A long line of yellow plated (Israeli) vehicles trying to leave at the new terminal building. The Jit Junction checkpoint is not manned, but the checking posts and the concrete dividers stand at the ready – for use, at any time. Beit Iba14:00 -- a government car is parked by one of the kiosks, and we meet with a Palestinian policeman, an inspector, who’s together with an American born Palestinian. Both are from Tulkarm. The policeman passes daily through the checkpoint here to go to work at his police station in Nablus. Everyday. Almost daily, he is harassed. Almost daily, he has difficulty in crossing with his government car into Nablus. Almost daily a “problem” is discovered. In plain language, he is harassed on a daily basis. Just before the checkpoint is a brand new, bright red sign, telling all of us in three languages, that Area A lies beyond -- Palestinian territory, no entry for Israelis, and that such entry is illegal by Israeli law (a similar new sign has also been planted on Route 60, outside the Jewish settlement of Shavei Shomron). Who remembers the “kindness’ accorded Palestinian Israelis, just a couple of few weeks ago, for the celebration of Eid el Adhar, when they could enter the city to be with their families? No, that’s gone. To be truthful, the brand new sign is obscured by a large Israeli truck, standing closer than vehicles are usually allowed at the Deir Sharaf side of the checkpoint. Round the truck are a group of young people: Israeli film students. They are in good spirits, seem unaware of what is going on around. And why so cheerful? They’re not creating a documentary, they tell us, but a film “about a couple at a checkpoint.” An imaginary tale. So the checkpoint is just a backdrop, something unreal, something that serves their purpose. There are four or five students bustling about, plus two real looking soldiers, lounging about – a touch of reality. But this is fiction. The two soldiers are actors, dressed up in uniform. They cheerfully offer us to handle their look alike guns: plastic. It’s all just make believe. For sure, permission has been granted by the army: fiction is allowed, part of the lies. 14:20 -- to back up our thesis, a blue Israeli police jeep goes back and forth, back and forth, crossing the checkpoint innumerable times. Area A? Under the Palestinian Authority? When Palestinian police inspector is harassed every time he tries to get to his office? The students are still not back at university, so the checkpoint is quiet. Few people crossing, but for the first time in a number of weeks, the window facing Deir Sharaf is open, and Palestinians pass their IDs to the military police inside. In the other direction, no thorough checking of people or of packages. But this is not true of buses. At the vehicle checking post, soldiers get inside the bus, look under seats and in the overhead racks before letting a bus pass. The line of vehicles from Nablus is, for once, short.