Beit Iba, Tue 25.12.07, Morning

Place:

Beit Iba

Observers:

Ruti C., Elinoar B (reporting)

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Dec-25-2007

Morning

07:15-08:30 - School and university holiday (X-mas day), which means very sparse traffic coming into Nablus. Usually, at this hour, most those passing through are students. At the exit pedestrian traffic is much livelier, consisting of men only, usually manual laborers. The checkpoint now possesses state of the art technology: the new magnometer keeps screeching incessantly. It turns out that the culprits are the belt-buckles. To the usual checking of bags and parcels is now added sending the men back, removing their belts and then lifting their shirt-tails. Never mind. They'll learn to hold up their trousers by other means (suspenders?) just as students have learnt to carry their books in their hands to save time.

All this time we hear in the background the vulgar yells of the MP in the booth. This is her way of communicating with her colleagues.

The DCO representative is present. __._,_.___

Location Description

Beit Iba

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A perimeter checkpoint west of the city of Nablus. Operated from 2001 to 2009 as one of the four permanent checkpoints info-icon closing on Nablus: Beit Furik and Awarta to the east and Hawara to the south. A pedestrian-only checkpoint, where MachsomWatch volunteers were present daily for several hours in the morning and afternoon to document the thousands of Palestinians waiting for hours in long queues with no shelter in the heat or rain, to leave the district city for anywhere else in the West Bank.
From March 2009, as part of the easing of the Palestinian movement in the West Bank, it was abolished, without a trace, and without any adverse change in the security situation.