Mornng

To our surprise conditions at the wall were better than we saw them the week before. A "mysterious" hand cleared the field a bit, and the building rubble, which was piling at the wall, vanished. There was no army in sight (and the transit drivers told us this was so since the early hours). The stream of people was heavy. After a while we took the bus to Sawahre.Down in the Wadi Naar checkpoint was a very long line of people and cars. People of all ages were climbing up the hill, arriving at the top breathless and sweating. People turned to us to saying "This will bring the next Shahid and the one after and the one after!" The Kiosk checkpoint was busy. From the Bethlehem direction we counted 10 waiting cars and 5 more from the Abu-Dis road. Of 6 BP soldiers, only one was checking both cars and people. 9 Palestinians were waiting for their ID's. We went to speak with the commander, who was cordial in a very hostile way, and warned his soldiers not to speak with us. He was just plain un-cooperative.Suddenly a BP jeep came by, driving at high speed. A BP was standing on the back seat, his head looking out at the car roof, with a pointed gun. The road was full of people making their way to the transits and the bus. Before we could take in the situation we heard shooting. Running down the road we saw very many nervous people, who told us that the shot we heard is the sound of a kind of a bullet that sounds like shooting but is intended to warn and frighten people.We called the Humanitarian dept. of the army. Maybe this "did it", or our presence - immediately the detained people were released and the cars finally started to move. We heard reports on conditions at A-Zayem, and since the IDF thinksPalestinians who cross the wall at Abu Dis should go through A-Zayem, so at around 10:00 we turned to A-Zayem, where we found a few bored soldiers and cars were let go in a smooth undisturbed manner.