Anabta, Sarra, Beit Iba

ANABTA, SARRA, BEIT IBA, Monday 27 December 2004 AMObservers: Roni S., Edna M., Susan L. (reporting) Guest: Neta K., Emanuel L. colour=red>07:15 AnabtaIt was very cold and very quiet: either side of the barrier in this unmanned checkpoint stood lines of buses and taxis, while pedestrians walked from one side of the barrier to another – theusual sight here. Some of the taxi drivers told us of atroublesome unannounced checkpoint that has beenon the main road just before Jit since yesterday: it's oppositeSarra on one side and Kedumim on the other. We head that way.07:40 Sarsa/Kedumim main road There was a long line of buses and cars, everybody and their belongings being thoroughly checked. The commander of the unit was unpleasant inthe extreme. "You annoy us as we try to work." Not surprisingly, heheckled the Palestinians. We observed and monitored (aswe should), noting that a couple of minutes after our exchange with thecommander, traffic started flowing freely. But a couple ofminutes later, all traffic was again stopped, and everyone was checked.The usual open, close, open, close, etc.Just before Beit Iba, a yellow minibus driver hailed us and told us a story of soldiers harassing him and his children. The driver promised us a phone call with more details but , although he's been called twice since then, the following day we still had heard no more from him. 08:15 – 09:30 Beit IbaThere was a river of white clay mud in Beit Iba, a throng of taxis,buses, trucks, food vendors and pedestrians. Surprisingly, thecheckpoint itself was not only dry, but also quiet. A very tall young man, carrying a newish violin case, strode towards the checkpoint, towering above everybody else . It was theviolin player! [a young Arab musician who was compelled to play for the soldiers at a checkpoint and whose case hit the international headlines. He has since become a sort of celebrity in Israel and the Occupied Territories]. The cheerful demeanor of A. [the representative of the District Coordinating Office (DCO) -- the army section that handles civilian matters; it generally has representatives at the checkpoints ostensibly to alleviate the lot of the Palestinians -- typified this watch, and it was good to see him back here after some weeks' absence. He stood outside the pillbox, waving people forward, facilitating the movement of a line that progressed steadily all the time. As long as people had an ID card ,they were waved through, and it mattered not at all to A. if men andwomen came together, or if young men were in the over 35's line. On theother side – and from inside the pillbox -- a young soldier gave people wanting to leave Nablus a harder time, scrutinizing their ID cards and theirpackages. In the detention compound were five men, three of them certainly over35 years old.[Detainees are, typically, men aged from 16 to 30 or 35 who have no passage permits; recently, young women, too, have been detained. The detainees' ID details are phoned through to the General Security Services (GSS, also known as the Shabak or the Shin Bet, the Hebrew acronym for the GSS) for checking against a central list of security suspects and the answers are then relayed back to the checkpoints. This cumbersome process can take considerable time, and that can be prolonged even more if the soldiers wait to accumulate a batch of ID cards before passing them on to the GSS , or if they behave in a similarly tardy manner at the end of the process, waiting until they have a batch of GSS clearances before they release individual detainees. Meanwhile, the detainees are virtually prisoners at the checkpoint where the soldiers retain the ID cards until the entire process is completed]. On being asked why they'd been detained, the soldiers gave us the usual response of "checking with …", but four were released soon after our arrival. One was sent back to Nablus.There were many trucks that passed through , all carefully checked; only one,laden with bananas, had to turn back to Nablus.