Category: Reports

Two Reports From Qalandiya Checkpoint

Fifty People Detained at Qalandiya Checkpoint

from brightonpalestine.org, 16th October

I passed through Qalandiya checkpoint today on the way back to Hebron.

As the bus reached the Ramallah side of the “terminal” the passengers got out and walked towards the pedestrian gates. When I had passed the turnstiles I saw that around fifty Palestinians were waiting at the checkpoint. To get to the Jerusalem side they had to walk through another turnstile, put their possessions through a metal detector and follow instructions shouted at them from Israeli soldiers sitting behind reinforced glass. The soldiers behind the screens control whether this area is open or closed. As I entered, the area was closed and an old man was isolated between the turnstiles with the soldiers.

The soldiers behind the glass barked instructions at him in Hebrew and in English through a crackly microphone. Either the old man was hard of hearing or could not understand either of these languages. The soldiers told him to put his wallet and ID card on top of the metal detector. The confused man tried to put his things through the metal detector and was met by a shout from the soldiers.

By this time the number of people waiting to go through was increasing rapidly. The people waiting tried to shout to the man and explain to him what to do. The man became increasingly confused and tried to come closer to us so that we could explain. He was called back by the soldiers.

Eventually the man was able to do what the soldiers wanted and proceeded through the metal detector to the second set of turnstiles and to the Jerusalem side of the terminal.

The number of people waiting was still increasing but the soldiers took their time until there was a huge frustrated, angry crowd on the Ramallah side. It included a frail man, recovering from an eye operation, who got caught in the metal turnstiles as the soldiers operated them from behind the glass.

This kind of humiliation is an everyday, banal occurence at Qalandiya checkpoint for those with permits to pass through. For others, Qalandiya, flanked on either side by the apartheid wall and other checkpoints, separates them from their family and friends whilst keeping them confined in ghettos.

The Wall Must Fall

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Inside Qalandiya Checkpoint on the 3rd Friday of Ramadan

from the Machsom Watch mailing list. by Roni H, 13th October 2006

When we arrived at 9:20 at Qalandiya and heard the shooting of tear gas and stun grenades, I called the Civil Administration’s hot line and received the succinct answer: “when Arabs run riot, the army has to shoot “.

Inside the checking area hell was breaking loose. About 600-700 densely packed Palestinians (maybe even more) and dozens of soldiers. It was difficult to breathe in the crowd that pushed against the turnstiles. The soldiers waited on the other side of the turnstiles and caught every man who looked younger than 45, checked his ID and pushed him back to the north. The impression was of a gigantic wrestling match, with the soldiers carrying clubs in addition to their usual arms. Some of the men tried six times to pass and six times they were sent back. Even to those who were already 44 no “discount” was given.

The uproar was enormous when the loudspeakers announced at 9:30 that “only women and man above 45 can pass. Permits are not valid because of the closure”. Several men turned to me, shouting excitedly: “Yesterday they announced in the media that men over 40 and holders of entry permits to Israel will be able to get through and now, when we have come all the way from Nablus and have passed 6 checkpoints they change the rules!”, “Is this the way you respect freedom of religion?”, “What do I have an entry permit for, when they do not respect it when there is closure. More that half of the year there is closure!”, “Only once a year we want to pray at the Al Aqsa mosque and also this is forbidden! Why is a man of thirty excluded from the prayer?”, “Is this the way you want to make peace?”, “We’ll never forgive you for not letting us pray at the holy mosque in Ramadan”. I could ! sense a wave of hatred rolling through the crowd.

When I heard the midday [Israeli] news later that day, I could not believe my ears: “Men over 40 and holders of entry permits were allowed into Jerusalem.”

The “waiting room” was crowded with hundreds of people, when at 10:00 about 20 border policemen entered, positioned themselves along the back side of the room and tried to push the younger men out of the checkpoint area. Some of them pretended to be on their way out, but made instead a fast U-turn and returned behind the soldiers.

A man with an eight year old child told me that his 10 year old has been lost and that he might be already on the other side waiting for him. I tried to call somebody from the police (although it was useless under this circumstances and it was impossible to hear one’s own voice) but realized that now I have lost this man in the crowd and could not find him again.

Because of the jostle, women could not get to the turnstiles and gathered at the left side of the fence separating the waiting from the checking area. We tried all together to call the attention of the soldiers so that they will give them an alternative way to pass through. Women in wheelchairs and women with small babies were afraid to be crushed by the crowd. At last, at 10:10 a passage on the left hand side was opened for the women and quite a number of them could get through. Their teenage sons though, if they looked over 15, were sent back. Several men tried to join the women but the soldiers screamed at them and pushed them back brutally. In order to frighten the people with a terrible piercing sound the soldiers were beating the metal walls of the passage with their clubs. Nothing helped. Everyone wanted to go through. At 10:30 this passage was closed.

In the meantime, some border policemen had positioned themselves at the entrance to the waiting area and did not let anybody in who appeared to be less than 45. Time was running out. The prayers were to start at 12:00 and the way to the old city is long and rife with additional checkpoints. Even men with Jerusalem IDs could not make their way to the turnstiles where hundreds of people were still crowded. They did not give up hope that at the last moment the gates to Jerusalem will be opened. To express their protest against the holdup they broke out into the chant “God is the greatest”.

Twenty border policemen came menacingly from one man to the other and checked their IDs. When they came across a male younger than 45 they tried to push them out of the checkpoint area – without much success. The men were adamant. Outside, a cordon of soldiers alongside the parking lot prevented the entry of additional Palestinians. Nevertheless there were men who got through the cordon and then through the entrance check and then even through the first turnstile only in order to be sent back at the last station! The anger was growing. “Israel understands only force and violence!”, “Just imagine that only one of all these thousands of people will loose his nerves and become violent!”. At 11:15 three shots were heard from outside. Because of the late hour some people were left frustrated and sad. At 11:30 a group of about 30 soldiers started again to beat against the metal walls of the waiting room, making a frightening noise and to swing their clubs over the heads of the people. Followed by the threatening soldiers they ran out in fear from the blows. All of a sudden the checkpoint was empty.

Next Friday, the last one in Ramadan, the unequal battle between civilians whose only desire is to pray at the Al-Aqsa mosque and the Israeli army who want to control the religious life of the Palestinians, will be even more vehement.

“Those are the rules” in Tel Rumeida

by ISM Hebron, October 17th

At 12.35pm two soldiers asked a Human Rights Worker (HRW) sitting opposite checkpoint 56 (the main entrance in and out of the Israeli controled H2 part of Hebron) to not watch the soldiers at the checkpoint and to move up the hill away from the checkpoint. The HRW refused to do this and the soldiers then rather strangely asked the HRW to move over to the other side of the road. The HRW did this, as this position is actually closer to the checkpoint and affords a better view of both the soldiers and the Palestinians passing through.

At 3pm on Shuhada Street, a HRW said “good afternoon” to two passing soldiers who were walking past. One of the soldiers responded by coming up to the HRW and very aggressively kicking the door to a Palestinian house close to the HRW’s face. He obviously found this very amusing, as he laughed loudly as he moved down the street. When the HRW asked the soldier why he had done this, the second soldier responded, “He doesn’t like you”. A few minutes later, a Palestinian man who had been walking down Shuhada Street in the opposite direction to the soldiers told the HRW that the aggressive soldier had told the second soldier that he should hit the Palestinian man in order to make the HRW take a photograph.

At roughly 4pm, four Israeli border police and a regular Israeli policeman walked down Shuhada Street from Beit Hadassah settlement, one pausing to look at the HRW stationed there and to peer into her bag. The soldiers then stopped at checkpoint 56 and started stopping most young Palestinian men who passed through the checkpoint into Tel Rumeida and taking their ID cards to be checked. This continued until 5.05pm when the border police left. During this hour and 5 minutes, between 20 and 30 Palestinians were detained and had to wait in a line by the side of the road for their IDs to be returned to them. This took between 10 minutes and half an hour at a time when the Palestinians were making their way home for their evening meal after having been fasting all day for Ramadan. One man was kept for longer than the others – roughly 35 minutes. At one point during this detention, a border policeman asked the man his name, got his ID from the policeman who was holding it, waved in the man’s face, then gave it back to the policeman so that the detention could continue. At one point, the Palestinian obviously got fed up with waiting and stood up to leave, but was prevented from doing so by the border police until they were finished with his ID. When a HRW asked one of the border policemen why they had done the ID checks at this particular time of the day, he answered, “Those are the rules”.

At 8pm a man was detained for walking past the Tel Rumeida (Eli Yishei) settlement. The man was new to the area and did not know about the army restrictions on using the road. One soldier, at the Tel Rumeida guardpost, was agitated and gesticulated with his gun.

Israeli Settlers Annex 150 Dunams of Palestinian Lands in Susia

by ISM media team, October 17th

The Palestinian news agency WAFA reported yesterday that settlers from the illegal colony of Susia, east of Yatta in the south of the Hebron region, annexed 150 dunams of farmland, plowed them and planted several trees. The annexed orchards are located near the colony. According to the agency, the settlers planted olive, almond, and evergreen trees, while Israeli soldiers closed the area and barred the Palestinian owners of the orchards from entering it.

The Palestinian residents did not receive any annexation orders from the Israeli authorities and were not given any chance to defend their lands in front of any Israeli court. Most of the newly annexed areas belong to the families of Al Shamesty, Abu Sabha, and Al Sha’abeen.

Settlers in the south Hebron Hills are notorious for their violent attacks on local Palestinian farmers and their property. In September masked settlers attacked and hospialised 79-year-old Khalil Nawaja, just the latest in a series of attacks on farmers. In the summer, international human rights workers volunteering in the area at the invitation of local Palestinians were attacked by masked settlers from Susia.

In a separate incident, settlers expanded a cattle ranch in the Um Zeitouna area, which is a Palestinian area located between the illegal Israeli colonies of Karmiel and Maon, south-east of Hebron city. Farmers in the area told WAFA that colonist’s bulldozers are destroying the annexed Palestinian lands in order to expand the ranch.

The farmers added that the colonists placed concrete blocks, some fixed to the ground, and installed barracks in the ranch that was constructed 15 years ago on lands annexed from the Palestinian residents.

Israel Plans House Demolitions in Al Jiftlik, Jordan Valley

from brightonpalestine.org, October 16th

I visited Al Jiftlik, a Palestinian town in the Jordan Valley last week in the hope of making connections between grassroots groups in the valley and in Brighton.

Al Jiftlik is in the Israeli controlled area of the valley although it is part of occupied Palestine. The residents leased land from the Jordanian state before 1967 but have no ownership. Since 1967, 98% of the valley has come under Israeli colonist or army control. Palestinan residents in the Israeli controlled areas have not been able to obtain permits to build new structures since 1967. The majority of residents of Al Jiftlik live in tents. Any new structures are bulldozed by the Israeli army.

We met a member of the village commitee for Al Jiftlik. Like many other residents he has little choice but to work for Carmel-Agrexco on a nearby Israeli colony (all Israeli colonies -or “settlements”- build in the West Bank or Gaza are illegal under international law). Carmel-Agrexco are 50% owned by the Israeli state and are the largest exporter of fresh produce from the West Bank colonies to Europe. 60% of their produce is sold in the UK. Many Palestinians work for Carmel-Agrexco in the valley for as little as 35 shekels per day (about US$8 or £4.5) with no sick pay or employment contracts. The man we spoke to was paid slightly more as a supervisor.

We were told that 25 homes in Al Jiftlik were scheduled for demolition by the Israeli army. The owners of the homes had been given notice of the demolition in the last two months and had been called to appear before a military tribunal at the nearby colony to appeal against the decision.

The representative of the village commitee was pessimistic about the prospect of fighting the demolitions saying “the army do what they want”, but he was grateful for any outside interest in the village.

The destruction of the few remaining stone structures in a village where most people live in tents can only be motivated by a desire to ethnically cleanse the area. The Israeli restrictions are, on the one hand, making life impossible in the valley and, on the other, revoking the permits of Jordan Valley residents who leave the valley for any substantial period of time or who do not have a permanent abode in the valley. This new wave of house demolitions in Al Jiftlik is a part of that process.

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Update on Al Jifflik Tent School

from brightonpalestine.org, 17th October

Al Jifflik is a small town in the Jordan Valley. Most of the residents of Al Jifflik live in temporary plastic structures as Israeli miitary law prohibits the building of new structures.

When I visited Al Jifflik in April the local children were studying in a school constructed from 6 large canvas tents (see previous report). The villagers had erected these tents over a year ago to provide local education for their children, who would otherwise have to travel through unpredictable military checkpoints to the UNRWA school.

Since then teaching in Al Jifflik has ground to a halt, as it has all over Palestine. The US and EU sanctions on Hamas means that teachers have not been paid since the elections. The tents are being used to teach a few essential exam classes

However, the people of Al Jifflik have defied the military imposeed building restrictions and the bureaucracy of aid organisations and obtained money from a local agricultural association to build a stone structure to house the local students. The headteacher said that they were afraid that the Israeli military would come to demolish the school but they were not willing to go on exposing their children to the sun in the summer and thew rain and cold in the winter.

Bil’in Cameraman in Court Tomorrow

by the ISM media team, October 16th

Emad Bornat, the Reuters cameraman and video-journalist who was kidnapped by Israeli forces after a demonstration in Bil’in on October 6th, has been in detention now at Ofer military prison for 10 days. Emad was due to have a hearing yesterday to determine his bail conditions after the military authorities insisted that he live outside Bil’in. This hearing never happened and today there are no judges available so Emad has to wait until tomorrow to hear where and under what conditions he will be allowed to live.

Because Emad is so ‘dangerous’ the military are also demanding that he live in a place easily accessible for the Israeli army and that someone be responsible for supervising him. Emad, a respected video-journalist whose work featured in the award-winning “Bil’in Habibti”, is accused of throwing stones at soldiers whilst simultaneously filming.