International Checkpoint Watch - Daily Observations
Date: July
30, 2001
Time: 16:35-18:00
Place Observed: Atara
Checkpoint
Number of Soldiers Present, Soldiers’ Names, ID#’s, License Plate #’s, Etc.:
Events Witnessed:
Everything
is very quiet, not a lot of cars, but the road is half blocked by a mass of
stones. The cars have to wait about 100 meters distance from the checkpoint and
four soldiers check every single car for a long time. Some people are waiting for almost one hour, including a car
from the Red Cross with medicine inside.
16:35 A Palestinian-American citizen is being detained.
We speak to him and find out that he had been waiting for 1 1/2 hours. He
states that he does not know what the problem is and that the Israeli soldiers
will not tell him why they are detaining him.
The soldiers are friendly to us.
After a few minutes, they come to us and ask us who we are. One soldier’s
inquires about a “group leader," but we decline to offer him the
information. We ask them why it takes such a long time to check the American’s
car, and suddenly they become very busy and try to find out what the problem is.
They start to explain to us that the car belongs to an Israeli and might be
stolen and suddenly they start to talk to the American and explain the problem
to him. However, after we persist several times, they let him go.
The
soldiers attempt to joke with us and also try to threaten us.
One soldier asks if we are not afraid, explaining that the Palestinians
might attack them and then we would be in the line of fire.
17:30
The soldiers start to play with their guns and to make jokes while the
Palestinians
wait in their cars. We ask them to continue their job or allow people to drive
through. They tell us that they can
do whatever they want and that they are "practicing," but continue
their job immediately.
The soldiers seem to be civil and relatively non-confrontational to people
passing the checkpoint. They do not
detain anyone except the American.