International Checkpoint
Watch - Daily Observations
Date:
18/02/02
Time: 14:55 – 17:00
Place Observed:
Surda
Number of Soldiers Present: Initially four soldiers,
three in concrete enclosure and one in comoflauged netting on hill across from
checkpoint. Police jeep with two
police also present. Later a jeep
with two additional soldiers come for change in shifts.
Soldiers Names, ID #’s, License Plate #’s, Etc:
Military jeep # 610 765
Police jeep license # 22259
Events Witnessed:
14:55- Upon arrival the road on the Surda side of the checkpoint in blocked to vehicle traffic by concrete blocks. There is light pedestrian traffic, twice as many traveling from Ramallah to Surda. Two medical vehicles are stopped. Other vehicle traffic not attempting to pass. Soldiers stopping random young men walking in both directions for ID check and holding them less than a minute, just long enough to glance at ID. Stopping about three people every five minutes. Vehicles on Surda side parked 20 meters from concrete blocks on that side of the checkpoint.
15:00- Medical vehicles permitted to pass.
15:02- Police jeep license # 22259 leaves toward Bet El.
15:04- Medical vehicle
arrives from road to Jalazone and is permitted to leave two minutes later.
15:27- APC decends down
hill from Ramallah to the bottom of the hill, then immediately returns.
15:30- Soldiers in
camoflauge netting on hill opposite the checkpoint laughs as a women drops the
bag on her head to the ground. The
soldiers stop checking people at this point.
15:34- Private car with
green Palestinian plates drives up to checkpoint and is waved through up hill
toward Jalazone without a check.
15:36- A man from the
Palestinian National Authority Preventative Security Forces is recognized by the
soldiers and stopped.
15:37- Jeep # 610 765 with
two soldiers leave toward Bet El.
15:38- Ambulance arrives
and is waved through.
15:45- A second private car
with green Palestinian plates is waved through toward Jalazone.
15:46- Private car with
yellow Israeli plates is refused passage through checkpoint from Ramallah toward
Jalazone.
15:54- A young man who says
hello to the PNA PS man is stopped for ID check.
16:06- The PNA PS man is
permitted to leave.
16:08- APC heads down hill
from Ramallah toward Bet El.
16:15- After an ID check of
the driver, Soldiers allows taxi to drive from Ramallah side up to concrete
blocks on Surda side in order to unload baggage.
16:21- Jeep # 610 765
returns from direction of Bet El for change of shifts.
Soldiers begin to check IDs of random young men again.
16:26- Jeep # 610 765
pushes aside a concrete block on the Surda side of the checkpoint in order to
get by. The taxis on that side of
the checkpoint immediately begin to scramble to get away, honking loudly at cars
in front of them. Jeep # 610 756
proceeds to come up behind the taxis and physically push them forward.
Taxis put on their brakes to avoid hitting vehicles in front of them, but
the jeep in stronger and they cannot stop.
Jeep knocks over stand of produce in the process.
A soldier gets out of the jeep and screams in the face of the produce and
kabab venders in Hebrew. The
venders report later that they do not know Hebrew.
The jeep then backs up and begins pushing cars away from the checkpoint
that had been parked at the side of the road.
Two cars smash together, crushing the front left of one car and the rear
left of another. The jeep managed
to push the vehicles, all of which had been about 20 meters from the concrete
blocks, about 42 meters from the blocks. The
jeep then returned to the checkpoint.
16:37- Jeep # 610 765
leaves toward Bet El.
16:47- The owner of one of the smashed cars, an American citizen,
returns to get his car.