'Atarot, Ar-Ram, Jaba (Lil), Qalandiya, Mon 1.12.08, Afternoon

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Observers: 
Natanya G. and Phyllis W. Phyllis reporting
Dec-1-2008
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Afternoon
Seriously? Does this make us safer?
15:15: 
We drove to Qalandiya via A Ram CP.  We saw no detaineesinfo-icon at the
CP.  We continued along the Israeli side of the Wall to Atarot
CP
.  We took the road to Givat Ze'ev and passed 42 vehicles waiting
in line at Atarot.  On our return we were vehicle number 50. 
It took us 15 minutes to pass the CP.  We continued to Qalandiya.

15:45 Qalandiya
Two passageways were operating, one with a long line and the other one
empty.  There was no line in the northern shed.  We quickly
learned that one line was for blue ID holders and the other for green
IDs only.  The line of Jerusalem residents was very long. 
We phoned Mahdi who didn't answer, so we called Daniel who said he would
look into what was going on.  Although he didn't call back, 
procedures changed very quickly and blue ID holders were soon passing
through the CP on both lines.

We also went through and out to the vehicle
CP
.  There were no lines at Qalandiya but we could see in the distance
that the lines at Atarot CP had not grown any shorter.

16:00:  Back in the pedestrian
CP
, both passageways were working but the flow of people had increased
and at this hour about 20 were waiting in each passageway and another
20 were waiting at the carousel in the northern shed.  After a
short time the number of people waiting decreased and the lines moved
faster.

16:30:  We decided to look
into a report from last week concerning a surprise CP on the road to
Bir Naballah.  On Monday afternoon the road to Bir Naballah was
free and there were no CPs on the road.  We returned to Jerusalem
via Lil CP, where traffic was flowing, and Hizmeh CP, where the traffic
was backed up to the entrance to the village.  There didn't seem
to be any particular reason for the traffic jam as soldiers were acting
as usual.
 

Because it was still quite early, we
decided to pay our respects to the Kurd family who were sitting in a
mourning tent near their former home in the Sheikh Gerach neighborhood. 
Many neighbors and children were visiting the mourning tent but "Um
Kamel" invited us to join her and told us what the settlers, with
the approval of Israel's justice system, had done to her and her family,
evicting them from their home and causing the death of her husband,
"Abu Kamel".  It was very sad to see the suffering of
this noble woman and to hear once again about the injustice perpetrated
in our name.