'Anabta, Thu 14.1.10, Morning
10:45 - Anabta
there are soldiers and they are inspecting those who are leaving Tulkarem.
The Village of Aqaba: About a kilometer west of the Tyasir CP there is a beautiful village. All the houses are whitewashed; the streets are clean and there is a new mosque with two minarets, that you can see when you drive to the Tyasir CP from the Valley. In the new / refurbished village, there is a large kindergarten full of games and swings, a library and a cultural center. There are 700 residents in Aqaba and most of them live in Tubas, Nablus, and Jordan. And why is that?
In 1970 the military government of the occupation proclaimed that Aqaba is a military area, and built a military base in the middle of the village (about 50 meters from the school). The fields of the village became areas for target practice and for training. Armed jeeps galloped through the streets of the village. They even built a model Palestinian village in the fields near the real village in order to practice occupying a village of that kind.
Throughout the years, many appeals were made to the courts until in 2003, the Israeli Supreme Court handed down the judgment that it was illegal to have a military base in the center of a populated village, and that people's lives are more important than the security needs for a military base. The base was dismantled and a small proportion of the residents returned to their village. Today, there are 300 residents in the village; it is part of the C area but it is 'too' close to the Tyasir CP and to the two military bases nearby. Most of the houses in the village, as well as the kindergarten, the mosque and the clinic - were given orders to be destroyed, and any day a bulldozer can come and take them down. The Head of the Local Council, Sammy Sadek, an invalid in a wheel chair, has many contacts in international organizations and with the help of contributions from Norway, Germany, Sweden, Japan and the USA, he has built a glorious village.
Isolation and closure
in the Jordan Valley -- additional information
We have known for some time that the Valley is closed and isolated, and it is possible to go from the valley to the West Bank (of which the Valley is legally an integral part), only through the CPs (Tyasir, Hamra, and Maaleh Ephraim), and we know that all along Road 578 in the northeast part, a deep ditch was dug in order to prevent the passage of vehicles. Well, about half a kilometer west of that ditch, near the village of Atuf, there is a second ditch, just in case some acrobat with a motor might succeed in flying over the eastern ditch. This ditch is deeper and the mountains of earth taken out of it provide an additional means for blocking traffic -- much higher. From now on, say -- two deep ditches separate the Palestinians, residents of the Jordan Valley from schools, clinics, grocery stores and all their life needs on the West Bank!!!!
Northeast of Nablus -- there is a surprise CP. There is a long queue of vehicles leaving Nablus on the way to Jenin and to the north of the West Bank or to the Jordan Valley. Cars traveling north are inspected one by one. The passage to the south is open (something that can change in a minute ....). The Palestinians tell us that yesterday and the day before there was a CP there at this time of day..