Qalandiya

Translator: Charles K.

They’re all smiles at Qalandiya this morning! That also happens sometimes.

05:20 It’s still dark when we arrive; there’s already a long line at the vehicle checkpoint. The parking lot isn’t full yet. Passengers descend from a bus, hurry to the pedestrian crossing. We follow them. The beigeleh seller has set up in the covered area this morning.

A surprise awaits us inside – there’s almost no line. Four inspection stations are open; when the revolving gate opened for people to enter, everyone waiting went through.

That continued throughout our stay there. People emerge from their rides, come running and are then surprised to discover there’s no line. An older man says to us: “What’s going on? There’s nobody here.” We saw many smiles, surprised gestures, occasional exclamations: “It’s as if there’s a closure,” or “Like on Saturday.”

A young man begins speaking with us, says he works for Soda Stream in Meshor Adumim. He’s waiting for transportation to work, which arrives at 6 AM. With our slight Arabic and his slight English we try to decipher the signs: free legal advice (re. municipal taxes, for example). No phone number, but there’s an address to which people may come on Saturdays.

People went through the revolving gates without waiting almost all the time we were there, and a few minutes later had gone through inspection. Usually the soldiers stop the revolving gates, people wait in the fenced corridors crowded together during rush hour, and when the gates stop they remain packed together like sardines. There was no sign of that today. A young man who’d come with his companions from one of the buses grins and motions as if to jump over the fenced corridors, as he’d doubtless done often in the past to get ahead on line. Today there’s no need.

Two officers arrived about 6 AM, followed a little later by a male and a female police officer. Since there were no lines, no one waited for them at the humanitarian crossing, nor did they have to open it. So the four of them disappeared into the cage where the soldiers sit, and left for the DCO about 06:15.

Occasionally there were announcements over the loudspeaker. We couldn’t understand what was said, but the tone was calm and everything seemed relaxed today. We don’t know the reason for the change; we’re glad, of course.

06:30 We left, in a good mood for a change. Today we were also smiling. The parking lot wasn’t completely full. The sun already shone through the clouds (photo attached).

The drive to the vehicle checkpoint was chaotic, as usual. Many vehicles crowd into the plaza on the way to the checkpoint, honking, the traffic laws viewed only as recommendations. But they went through the checkpoint itself smoothly, showing IDs and crossing quickly – we as well as others. Because it was early our drive back to the center of town was fast and smooth; we parted at Giv’at Ram a little after 7 AM.

Later I visited the Israel Museum, including the show of Gid’on Gechtman’s work. “The Line,” his 1988 installation (photo attached), reminded me of the on-line conversation of the past few days and I thought that perhaps – just before the Qalandiya crossing is dismantled and travel between Israel and Palestine will be like among countries in the European Union – the fenced corridors at Qalandiya will be replaced by the red velvet ropes of Gechtman’s work…