Afternoon

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06/11/2002
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There is a long line of cars and drivers at the Southern checkpoint. Drivers complain that the soldiers are closing the car lane intermittently in order to delay their drive home to end the Ramadan fast. At about 4:30 they should be home breaking the fast with the family. A car driver advances to the checking point and the female soldier (it seems there are young women volunteering at the checkpoints now) shouts to him to go back and wait. This female soldier is the same one that last week refused to check a Palestinian truck and kept the lane shut for "educational" reasons. We were very afraid of what could happen but were very surprised to see here the male solidarity functioning this time and the Palestinian telling the male soldier: "You have to teach her how to talk" and the soldier letting him go through leniently. This intermittent closing of the car lane from south to north went on during the whole time we were there. At one point, around 4:30 when the anger and tension were at their highest, the checkpoint officer came to the southern checkpoint to make order and started shouting to the car drivers: "Look what you have done!, what a mess".We saw a disturbing event: One Palestinian took it upon himself to direct the traffic. This "traffic director" then would go to the soldiers and tell them who had gone in out of his turn. At this point the soldiers would happily close the car lane and "go to make order" by demanding that the offender go back to the beginning of the line and cue again. During our shift we did not manage to speak to any soldier, they were very hostile and whenever we tried to ask a question they would answer: "You are disturbing me during my work". It seems they were instructed to answer in this precise way.At 4:40, although the soldiers were complaining that they have too much work, we saw 2 soldiers checking the cars and 3 soldiers standing around and chatting among themselves.At 5:10 we were informed that there were detaineesinfo-icon at the Northern checkpoint and also saw a group of about 40 Palestinian detainees at the Southern checkpoint. They told us they had been apprehended around the quarry since 12 at noon, and were without food or drink, and complained of being insulted. We called the Moked and around 6:00 they were released. The soldiers asked them to wait outside the checkpoint and asked one of them to be the representative and speaker for the whole group. We intervened and told the soldiers it is forbidden to send off anyone without his ID. Again the soldiers said they could not speak to us but kept close watch of whom we were phoning to and what we were saying over the phone to the Moked. On the way out, at the E-Ram checkpoint, we saw a sign that says: Dear resident: If you have a medical problem and have trouble going through the checkpoint, please call the office of the Civil Administrationinfo-icon, telephone 9977022. We heard from the Physicians for Human Rights that it is best to contact PHR directly. Maybe we have to make small cards with the numbers of PHR to give out at the checkpoints, in the same way we give out the Moked cards.