Nablus

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13/11/2003
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13.11.03

Hawarra, Shavi Shomron, Beit Ayba

Observers: Menuchah, Susan, Shelly, and a guest (Andrew, husband of
Susan)

Menuchah, Susan, and Andrew arrived at Hawarra at 12:15. There were
about 150 Palestinians waiting at the checkpoint, but the traffic
was proceeding. A similar number of people were waiting on the
other side of the checkpoint. A "seamline" volunteer was
there, so that the traffic flowed a bit more quickly.

At 13:30, we arrived at Beit Ayba. There were three detaineesinfo-icon
there, two of them had been waiting for two and a half hours,
because they were "rude to the soldiers". (The officer
said about one of them, "He did not speak to me nicely, so I
made him calm down. In another two hours, he will be quiet). One of
them said that he had already been detained there in the past. The
line included about 10 trucks and private cars, and on the other
side of the checkpoint, there were only three trucks. All of them
passed through without delay. All the pedestrians passed.
("Pedestrians" is a euphemism. There were among them a
woman in a wheel chair, and an older woman who walked supported by
two people).

Shelly arrived at Shavei Shomron at 12:45. (She got a lift from A.
A. (from Rabbis from Human Rights who is responsible for the olive
picking campaign). An Israeli Palestinian citizen was delayed there
for an hour, his hands tied behind his back. The soldier did not
allow Shelly to speak with the Palestinian, but he himself said
that he was delayed because he "acted out" at the
checkpoint, thought that he was entitled to do so because he is an
Israeli, and shouted at the soldiers". The soldier promised to
release him within 20 minutes, and he was freed after a half hour.
The soldiers had difficulty releasing the handcuffs from
him.

The meanwhile, about 20 people who had travelling in 6 taxis were
picked up by army jeeps in various places in the area, brought to
the parking lot of Shavei Shomron, and detained there since the
morning -- according to the Palestinian verson, since 4:00 a.m. in
the morning. According to the soldiers' verson, it was from 8 or 9
a.m. In the course of two hours, we succeeding in persuading the
soldiers to releast two of the taxis, in which there were, among
the passengers, old women, women with small children, and a
menstruating woman who had not been able to change her sanitary
pads since the morning and was very tense. (Shelly overheard one of
the soldiers say astounding sentence "They are
regulars").

The meanwhile, an army vehicle arrived and let off six Palestinians
at the checkpoint. The soldiers said that they were picked up
earlier with a man who was carrying 2000 bullets to Shechem
(according to the version of another soldier, there were 4,000
bullets). The man was detained, and the others were released. While
in the army vehicle, they had been blindfolded. When they were let
out, one of them had difficulty walking, and knelt next to the
vehicle, apparently from a sense of dizziness and nausea. He didn't
want to drink anything because he was observing the fast. Another
one lost his eyeglasses. The soldiers searched the vehicle but
couldn't find them. All six hurried away from the checkpoint.

The meanwhile, Menuchah, Susan and Andrew came and stayed with 4
drivers and their passengers who were still waiting. In spite of
our repeated appeals to the soldiers, and our calls to the
Humanitarian hotline, to the commander and to Shachar --who is the
equivalent of Ofer in this area. Two more hours passed before they
were released. That means that they were detained for a period of
about 12 hours. The meanwhile, the soldiers in armored vehicles
brought another 3 taxis to the checkpoint, but they were released.
During this whole time, there were lines of 6 to 12 vehicles,
including trucks and ambulances, which the soldiers checked one at
a time.

The guard changed at 15:00, and the soldiers on the second shift
were very crude, and were shouting and cursing. From time to time,
other soldiers from the base at Shavei Shomron stopped by, among
them the commander, Yair. We had a 15 minute conversation with him
during which he explained to us that the detainees were punished
because they were travelling on a road which was forbidden for
their use.

We left at 16:45