'Anin, Reihan, Shaked, Thu 8.1.09, Morning

Translation: Devorah K.

Today is the 13th day of the Gaza War -- 'Cast Lead'.

06:05  A'anin CP

The gates of the CP are open. At 06:10 the first person goes through. The CP commander, a reserve soldier, approaches us and says that he is happy to see us and that we are carrying out a holy task.We are told that about fifty people are waiting.
06:35 They close the lower gate in the direction of A'anin. About thirty people, five tractors and one donkey are crowded into the CP between the fences, and they are beginning to get annoyed. The soldiers ask one of the tractor drivers to tell his colleagues to keep order.
06:55 Three sweet children on a donkey, come up from the Bedoui village beneath the CP on the side of the seamline zone. They wait for a ride to school in Umm a-Reihan.
07:00 There are still about ten people waiting to go through.

07:10 Shaked-Tura CPPeople crowd near the turnstile at the entrance to the inspection pavilion. They want to go through from the West Bank to the seamline zone. The tempo of passage is especially slow. When we ask about it, a soldier tells us that many people came all at once. How many? About thirty.
07:20 Both older and younger children, all carefully groomed, go through from the seamline zone to school in Tura on the West Bank without being inspected.
07:40 A teacher who resides in Tura and teaches in Umm a-Reihan in the seamline zone went through in his car. Two teachers who were with him are still stuck before the turnstile, afraid that they will be late to school. The soldiers are new and the inspection is slow. We do not succeed in speeding up the passage of the teachers.
08:07 The teachers come out of the pavilion and go through to the seamline zone. They will be late for school. In the meantime, we hear about katyushas on Nahariya.

08:20 Reihan-Barta'a CPDrivers are waiting in the upper parking lot in order to drive workers to East Barta'a. They say that the passage is "o.k."; others say that it takes a long time. Pedestrians in the Palestinian parking lot enter immediately and wait in the sleeve at the entrance to the terminal building.
08:50 Four pickup trucks with goods, the first to enter the inspection compound at 07:00, are still being inspected. Seven additional pickup trucks are waiting for inspection. Four private cars have also been in inspection for a long time, and ten additional cars are waiting for inspection. Perhaps our telephone call to Ron from the passage-  administration helped, because after five minutes, they finished inspecting them and six (!) were invited to be inspected in the white tent. The pickup trucks have still not emerged.Our friend, the driver A., tells us that on Tuesday the CP closed between 7 and 8:40 in the evening. The dog smelled something suspicious in one of the cars and an alarm was sent for the explosion robot to come to the CP. It turned out that there was a chocolate bar in the car!

A woman settler from Mavo Dothan goes through in her car and notices us. She asks if we heard about the Katyushas in the north. When we answer that we did, she yells at us angrily, saying that we ought to be ashamed. We were ashamed for her.

09:10 We left the CP and traveled through East Barta'a. The  public works on the main road of the village are still going on - they are putting in street lights and roundabouts. The shops are open and very colorful.