Morning

Bethlehem: 6.30 am till 7.20 am. There was no curfew, and no movement of cars towards Bethlehem. There were a few cars - nuns, diplomats, journalists going to Jerusalem without any problems after their IDs were checked. A car with three Palestinians was held back for 20 minutes. The reason that was given to us – suspicion of theft of the car, even if all the papers of the car were in order. Pedestrians: when we arrived there was a line of 15 people in the direction of Jerusalem; it took 25 minutes for the last one to pass through. There was no movement of people in the direction of Bethlehem.There were Border Police at the checkpoint.El Khadr – 7.25 till about 10 am.When we arrived we saw soldiers climbing the hill on which the school is located. The checkpoint itself was without border police. Beyond the checkpoint, not far from the buses and the taxis, there was gathering of a group of about 30 youngsters and some adults among them. We went up to them and spoke with the adults, who were teachers, and they told us that the school had been closed. Three reserve soldiers standing at the school claimed that on Sunday and Monday, stones were thrown by the school’s students on the road, on cars of settlers. The teachers denied this. The soldiers told us that if there would be no throwing of stones that day and the following, they would open the school again. Five reserve soldiers were in the grove at the back of the school. One pointed a gun in the direction of the school. I asked him what was happening and he answered that there were children on the roof. He was not pointing his gun -- there was telescope at the end of the gun’s barrel”.Beyond the checkpoint, on the way back to Jerusalem, a jeep suddenly appeared with four border police. Within 25 minutes they held up 47 young men who had arrived by bus to the checkpoint, took their IDs, and made them stand in a line. It was done this way: tens of people got out of the bus and a border police, young and redhaired, who yelled out at them – “you, you” – everyone turned their head, “no, you, come here” . Women and elderly passed without problems, without their IDs being checked. It was totally arbitrary. But seeing 47 people standing in line was a difficult sight. Of the 47, the first ones waited over an hour and a half, and the last at least 20 minutes. From time to time the redhead was shouting: “move back, move back!”We spoke with the border police, particularly with the redhead, asking to speak with the commander, he said : “we are all commanders”. He said they send the names to the Shin Bet. They don’t know how long it takes, perhaps the computer is out of order and then it would take a long time… Yes, we saw that they phoned from the jeep, in the beginning, when they had only a few IDs, but when the number increased to 47 IDs on the window of the jeep, they did not phone anyone. At a certain moment one of the border police came out of the jeep with a package of IDs – green and orange – and we thought he was going to hand them out. Then the redhead said: “No, no, no – you don’t hand anything out”. Before that they had handed out about five IDs and one of the persons called out did not answer – they called out: “he escaped!!”. The redhead came to me and said: “He ran away – now they will be held up for a long time”. (apparently the man was tired of waiting, and went through the checkpoint without his ID?). At nine I called the NCO in charge of operations in the Bethlehem area. I told him that there people waiting more than an hour and asked if he could do something. He was polite and said to call back in 15 minutes. In the meantime, they returned the papers to about 10 men. I called again, after 9.30, and he answered that he had called, but said there might be problems and that the border police are allowed to hold them up… I said: “perhaps you can help anyway?” and he said he would call again. I asked him “to whom do you call, to the shabak?” No, he said, “ to the base.” After ten minutes, around 10 am, they returned all the IDs. And in a quick stroke the jeep drove away. People crossed the checkpoint and we returned to Jerusalem.