Punishment

No changes in the checkpoint procedures.  The lines aren't particularly long, but still – one more morning, one more checkpoint, and two stories.

How a martyr is created – An interview with a young Palestinian
Muhammad, a resident of Beni Naim in the Hebron Hills, speaks softly in Hebrew.  He's thin and very short, perhaps was malnourished, 18 years old but looks like he's 12.  He went through the checkpoint with a carton of toys, orange dogs whose heads wobble up and down on a spring.  He had a friendly conversation with two soldiers, one them an MP and the other the DCO representative.  He told them that he'll be coming back to the checkpoint with a knife, and showed them a release form from having been imprisoned by the army.  The DCO representative, who's in the regular army, nodded his head.  Nothing Muhammad said would be viewed as strange by anyone who is very familiar with the checkpoints.  When he left the checkpoing we invited him for a cup of coffee in Amjad's luncheonette, and asked him to begin at the beginning.  The parenthetical comments are mine (Inbal R.).

"Me, I had a fake ID card, I worked in Israel, I'd work 15 hours a day, make 300 shekels.  They caught me, put me in Muscovya (the jail in the Russian Compound) for five days, gave me a suspended sentence of three months to two years on condition that I don't re-enter Israel.  As soon as I got out I went home.  Me, I've got seven sisters and a little brother.  My father used to work for a bakery in Tel Aviv, now he isn't working.  My brother Iy'ad is 13, he works in Beersheva (illegally) for the Bedouin, makes 30-40 shekels a day.  I want to make 200-300 shekels a day, like I did in Israel.  I came here (the standard of living is higher in Nablus than in Hebron), started to sell housewares.  I'd come to the checkpoint every time, go through, make money, sell knives, towels, toys, all kinds of things.  Kobi, an officer, caught me, said to me:  You can't go through with knives.  I told him: OK, this is the last time, but know I want to go through.  He said to me, You're not going through.  He put me in the jorra (the holding pen), beat me up, slapped me, kicked.  I wanted to cry.  He left, I fled the jorra.  My friends told me to go back, get your ID card.  Friday (13.6.08) I came to the checkpoint with a friend (to get the ID card).  Took me to the jorra, handcuffed me tightly, and blindfolded me.  Told me, now you go to jail for four days.  Took me to Huwwara.  I gave them my phone number, they notified my family I'm in jail.
"My father, he doesn't care.  He wasn't home, he didn't know, he's not interested, so what, the main thing that I bring him money.  My mother took 1700 shekels, gave them to a lawyer, he got me out after 5 days.  They gave me release papers, no trial, no nothing.
"Now I want to return to jail.  In jail they told me that if I stay there a month my mother will get 1000 shekels.  They said, What would you do for that?  Bring a (big) knife to the checkpoint.
Question:  Do you know that the soldiers at the checkpoint could get frightened if they saw a knife, and kill you?
Muhammad shrugs and says: "I want money, food for my mother's home."  He finishes his coffee and asks whether he may go.

Who's story is mine?
There's always a conflict at the Beit Iba checkpoint between the taxi drivers, who are busy looking for passengers, and the soldiers, who move them away from the area of the checkpoint.  About twice a day the soldiers arrest a few drivers for a few hours.  Usually it works out alright, but not for Hitam.  Here's what he said happened to him two months ago:
A soldier came to chase two drivers away, and hit them.  Hitam intervened and said to the soldier: Why don't you just talk to them, not with your hands?  The soldiers put Hitam in the jorra and beat him severely.  Hitam lay there from 10 in the morning until 9 at night.  At nine they brought him to the base in Shavei Shomron, and at midnight took him to the hospital in an ambulance.  He was diagnosed with a fractured skull, a broken shoulder and an injury to his finger.  When he was released from the hospital he filed a complaint with the help of Machsom Watch, and the military police opened an investigation.
That's Hitam's story, and it can be assumed that the soldiers have a different story.  You can learn something about the attitude of those who control the checkpoint from a little handwritten note that a soldier gave Hitam instead of the ID card that was confiscated from him.  It's copied verbatim, except for a few words we couldn't decipher (Nov. 05 is the name of the company in the Haruv battalion, not the date).

"Hitam I'm a taxi driver who went wild at the Beit Iba checkpoint two days ago (with the taxis) Eyal MP  Shlomi squad leader Haruv.
I was arrested received medical treatment and my ID card at the battalion treatment location 93.  Please transfer to DCO Awarta for a new ID card.  In the event of any problem, contact Eyal "Bongi" at the checkpoint via MIRS."   -----  ------ (two unclear words) Nov. 05"

What interested us was the use of the first person, as the soldier takes it upon himself to speak in Hitam's name, but describes the situation from the army's point of view.  This note is a wonderful example not only of the inarticulate language of the army, but also of colonialism. 
Also of interest is the unexplained gap in the plot between two verbs: "I was arrested received medical treatment…"

.

 Natanya translating

 9:30  The Jit checkpoint isn't manned. 9:40  No cars entering Nablus, and few exiting.  We stand in our usual place outside the checkpoint in the empty area near the turn to Kochin in order to observe the exit lanes.  As noted, very little traffic, and even though there's a dog handler she isn't working, apparently because the weather is very hot.  The checkpoint commander approaches us and demands we move away because we're in a "sterile" area of his checkpoint.  We tell him that we've always stood there and it never bothered anyone before and in addition we have a right to stand here, etc. etc.  His response is to threaten us that if we don't move immediately he'll call the police.  We showed him the letter from the legal advisor but it didn't impress him, and since he didn't impress us either we stayed where we were a little longer than we had originally intended and then moved over to the area where pedestrians were being checked, fully expecting to have another argument. There were few pedestrians in either direction.  Three detainees in the pen, and of course we weren't allowed to talk with them.  Later we learned that two of them were caught trying to sneak in זולגים?"" and the third was a taxi driver.  We stood on the side within the area of the checkpoint and watched what was going on.  A veiled woman was checked in the booth by a female soldier, the commander checked the contents of pocketbooks belonging to women entering Nablus, and in order to do so demanded we move from where we were standing and again demanded we leave the checkpoint.We refused to leave and waited for the police whom he said he had called.  He tried to harass us by moving us around, providing a running report via cellphone to some anonymous person about every movement of ours that interferes with him and his soldiers and endangers them.  T., the DCO representative, who came over from the vehicle checkpoint, suggested to us that we not get involved with him.  They're regular army soldiers who are at the checkpoint for only a short time and they're not familiar with all the procedures…We waited over half an hour, and since the police still hadn't arrived we decided to leave.  When we started to go the officer ran after us and demanded we wait.  We refused and again showed him the document authorizing us to be present, and when he asked us to identify ourselves I, with supreme confidence, which turned out later to be incorrect, refused, because I thought that a soldier was forbidden to demand that a civilian identify themself or to detain a civilian.  To prove that he was right he showed us a document from 2004, handwritten on letterhead from "Kachol Lavan", but signed by the police, authorizing the soldiers to remove us from the checkpoints or to call the police.  The document didn't impress us (we kept it, and Osnat will try to pass it on.) 10:30  We left, and I gave the commander Machsom Watch's card (which was pretty stupid of me). 

Epilogue That afternoon a man telephoned Miki Fisher and wanted to know the names of the women from Machsom Watch who were at Beit Iba that morning.  When she asked who he was, he said that he was from Kachol Lavan and he wants to file a complaint against us with the police.  Miki refused to give him the information.Another example of the symbiotic relations between the army and Kachol Lavan/settlers.We're able to handle the harassment and the arbitrariness, but for the Palestinians who have to go through it every day it's simply insufferable.

Beit Iba
14:35 Sara

We drove up to Sara to see if the “barrier” was removed, as it was
reported in the newspaper today that more barriers were removed from
the West Bank. The huge mound of earth blocking the village of Sara
was still there. 14:50 Beit Iba

Seems quiet, there is not much commotion as we approach, there are no vehicles
waiting to enter, and none coming out of Nablus. There are 3 detainees, and within 10 minutes another one joins
them. We cannot get information about the detainees, and from where we
stand we can barely see them let alone talk to them. There are not many people at the checkpoint, about 6 men at each
turnstile, and actually more in the “fast” lane. There is a female
soldier who comes over to make order and she is telling the women to go
back, with hand movements and calling "back, back". After she has
the women back behind the point that seems to be the proper place to
stand as far as the soldier is concerned, she leaves for the vehicles
checkpoint. Then another soldier comes over, and with hand
movements in the opposite direction, calls for the women to "come,
come". We find out from the DCO that the young men being held have another 2
½ hours, they are being checked and they were found trying to get
through the checkpoint from fields around.__._,_.___    

Beit Iba,
14:35 Sara

We drove up to Sara to see if the “barrier” was removed, as it was
reported in the newspaper today that more barriers were removed from
the West Bank. The huge mound of earth blocking the village of Sara
was still there.

14:50 Beit Iba

Seems quiet, there is not much commotion as we approach, there are no vehicles
waiting to enter, and none coming out of Nablus.

There are 3 detainees, and within 10 minutes another one joins
them. We cannot get information about the detainees, and from where we
stand we can barely see them let alone talk to them. There are not many people at the checkpoint, about 6 men at each
turnstile, and actually more in the “fast” lane. There is a female
soldier who comes over to make order and she is telling the women to go
back, with hand movements and calling "back, back". After she has
the women back behind the point that seems to be the proper place to
stand as far as the soldier is concerned, she leaves for the vehicles
checkpoint. Then another soldier comes over, and with hand
movements in the opposite direction, calls for the women to "come,
come".

We find out from the DCO that the young men being held have another 2
½ hours, they are being checked and they were found trying to get
through the checkpoint from fields around.__._,_.___    

It
ended in blood. This report is sent first of all as a warning. There is
a a great danger that if this soldier is not removed from the checkpoint there
will soon be victims, bloody from his deeds, not only his beatings,
humiliations and abuse of the sort that is described here. We know who
he is and have his picture. We hope that those who read these reports
will discover who is responsible for the army unit at this checkpoint.

Natanya translating.

There is a change in shift which means the Palestinians have to wait and it is horrible.

Beit Iba

07:30-08:30. As we got to the checkpoint we were horrified to see an enormous crowd of people waiting in long lines, men young and not so young. The commander and his men are busy "educating" those wanting to leave or enter Nablus and they have to stand quietly behind the white line far from the booth: calls of "go back, go back" and the soldiers pushing and a loud shout erupts from the waiting crowd. It could be very frightening. The commander tells them in excellent Hebrew that he can close the checkpoint for up to 30 minutes. And that is it. He gives the order to the soldiers not to let people through for 30 minutes. And so it was. People had to stand and wait until he decided that they could go through again into Nablus.  We tried to explain to him that what he was doing was not legal but he refused to speak to us. He disappeared. The soldier in the booth said he could not disobey orders. Another soldier claims that they brought it on themselves. We proposed to the DCO to call a higher commander with experience. But the DCO seemed to be weak even though afterwards he showed more initiative.

We phoned the humanitarian centre and warned that there would be a human disaster to an attentive soldier. Again and again and again. We saw that phone calls were made to the DCO and the commander. At this stage the DCO representative took action and began letting people through with a quick and superficial checking and within 10 minutes everyone had gone through.  Only the soldier in the booth was left to deal with those unlucky enough to arrive at his station: the shirt taken up and the pants raised. It seems that someone has to keep on humiliating.