Beit Iba, Jit, יום ד' 28.5.08, אחה"צ

16:00  Beit Iba.  3 trucks at the entrance.  The road is empty.  Leaving Nablus – also empty.  Just a bus and a taxi.
At the pedestrian lanes:  To our surprise, a line of about 25 pedestrians at the entry to Nablus.  Usually, they hardly check people coming in.  The long lines are usually of people leaving Nablus, but this time there are no lines at all leaving Nablus, and the covered area is almost empty.

We asked what's going on and didn't receive a satisfactory explanation, except that the students are still on vacation (until 8.6.08).  Later it turned out that the line entering Nablus was caused by a change of shifts at the checkpoint.  As soon as the new shift started working, the line was eliminated.

But it still isn't clear why people entering Nablus are being checked so carefully, not only ID cards but also each package and its contents.

This time, the only difference between the entry and exit checks is that people exiting are asked to remove their belt, etc.

There's a DCO representative at the checkpoint.  When we asked him why people entering Nablus are being checked so carefully, he said that he thought that it was because there was hardly anyone leaving, and the soldiers are simply bored…(not clear).

No detainees.  The atmosphere is calm.  The commander and soldiers are behaving reasonably.  They don't chase us away, like others did a few weeks ago, not even from the metal container I was sitting on.

16:30  We left the empty  (and "boring") checkpoint.

16:50  The Jit checkpoint is empty.

17:10  Traffic is flowing freely at the Eliyahu checkpoint.