Jubara (Kafriat), Wed 30.4.08, Afternoon
What is forbidden to a horse is dafke permitted to a donkey.
A tale from real life.
17.00 The children's gate, 753, At Jubara.
9 detainees
, 8 humans and one donkey tied to a cart and amongst them a young man who has been there since 10am.
We phone the army and ask for help.
"Why has the lad beeen kept here since the morning without food or water"
The woman soldier replies, "Maybe he made problems at the checkpoint."
We ask "What problems did he (maybe) make. Please check."
After
a telephone conversation he is freed, 5 hours after having been
detained, with no further explanation but the others including the
donkey are still there.
We phone and ask "What about the other detainees and the donkey?"
We ask "What do you mean there are no other detainees. Are we seeing a fata morgana?"
She says "The soldiers say there are no other detaineed."
We do not give in. This is the second lie today.
The
first was at Jubara where the commander told us that there was an
action in the village and that it was not worth our while to go in. We
replied that that did not deter us and when we went in did not find any
signs of any action.
soldier came back to us and said that now the soldiers say that they
first have to free the workers who have permits and only after that the
illegal workers.
We
say, "But there are no workers with permits here." This is already the
third lie. They are all illegal workers. We explain that usually the
illegal workers are checked and allowed to pass on their way home. This
is the usual way. But the soldiers here are indifferent and do not
check and make them wait. The only action they take is to demand every
now and again that they move and sit somewhere else. That they are very
insistent about.
And they demand from the owner of the donkey that he go home without his donkey which he of couse will not do.
more phone calls. At last the soldier says that a captain will come to
the checkpoint to solve the problem. We wait together with the
detainees.
In
the meantime a man with two boxes arrives, one with flowers and the
other strawberries. The soldiers check every flower and every
strawberry. Each one is taken out of the box one by one. A long process
which takes great patience and is eventually successfully concluded.
The owner of the flowers and strawberries understands that the problem
with the donkey and the cart will soon be solved and that he can get a
lift. So he puts the boxes on the cars and waits with us in tense
anticipation.
The
jeep, the savior, arrives. The captain says that he does not understand
all these problems. One thing is for sure. No report has been made
about the donkey but only about a horse. As soon as we understood that
the horse was really a donkey….the order was given to release it
without a permit. And so all of us were freed to go hom.
said it was a horse and not a donkey? A RIDDLE. But the captain did not
insist on investigating and freed all to go on their way home. An
embarrassed soldier said to us, "Truly all the time I did not
understand why the whole time on the phone they kept speaking about a
horse."