Bethlehem, Etzion DCL, Tue 12.8.08, Morning

06:30 AM, Bethlehem Checkpoint: Worse than usual. The lines in front of the four (later five) checking posts were short. The pressure was, as usual, at the other side. People said that the metal fence was broken, and because of the crowding many were bruised and wounded by it. The DCL representative was present. He stood at the entrance area and looked at the going on. This did not change much the situation. We learned, though, that the soldiers manning the CP were new – an old excuse for the malfunctioning of this CP.

A man told us that this was the second consecutive morning that he missed the transportation to his work. He pays for his work permit 1,200 NIS, he said, and the ride from his home at Yata to the CP costs him 50 NIS.

Wednesday I met in Jerusalem an acquaintance, a woman living in Bethlehem whom we meet almost weekly at the CP. She told me that Monday she witnessed security guards beating brutally two handcuffed youngsters at Bethlehem CP. She was still under the effects of the shock. She tried, she said, to stop the guards, and one of them threatened to beat her. According to her the two Palestinians were hospitalized, one of them with a broken jaw. She reported the incident to B’Tselem.

08:15 AM, Etzion DCL: Several dozens of people. A man in his fifties asked us whether he stood any chance of getting a one day permit – he had some paper that he wanted to deliver to the man who used to be his employer, and became a friend. We told him that as far as we knew friendship was not a reason for getting a permit to enter Israel.