A morning at Qalandiya

Just after 6 am she arrived. Her hair neatly plaited and a radiant smile on her face. I had seen her many times previously at Qalandyia, the main checkpoint between Ramallah and Jerusalem, and she clearly recognised me always standing in the same place and with my distinctive EAPPI jacket. Her smile was disarming as she beamed her usual greeting. "Off to school," I said as she joined the back of long queue in the so called "humanitarian" lane where more than 200 women, older men, children, the handicapped and the sick had been waiting since before I arrived at 5.40 am. Her smile just broadened and I wished I could speak Arabic if only to make her ordeal here more bearable. Jane, not her real name, does this journey five mornings per week. She is six and has to be dropped off here usually with her brother but he is not here today as neither of her parents can afford the inordinate wait at the checkpoint to take her and older brother to school. On previous occasions when I have seen her she has coped with the experience with remarkable maturity, an experience that many adults find traumatizing.   

The big open shed where people were waiting to join the queues to go through the 80cm wide lanes to the turnstiles reverberated with the noise of soldiers barking instructions and the shouts, screams and laughter, (Palestinians have a capacity to retain their joy in life in the face of humiliation and oppression,) of the often frustrated and angry individuals who just wanted to get to work, to school, to a hospital appointment, to an interview.

No one comes through Qalandyia between 5 am and 9 am unless they absolutely have to. Some people, mostly men, were being processed very slowly through the main turnstiles. But there was no sign of movement for the women, the disabled, the sick and the children bunched in a mass of bodies waiting for the soldiers to open the "humanitarian" lane. This lane is only opened for a few minutes at a time sometime between 6.30 am and 7.30 am if you are lucky and is totally dependent on the good will of the soldiers on duty. Good will was in very short supply this morning.  

At 6.18 two soldiers, a policeman and a security guard decided to open the "humanitarian" lane, but the queue had now lengthened considerably. As people surged forward to get through to the checking stage there were screams from those being hurt in the crush and angry shouts from those who were unable to make it through in the minute or so the gate was open before it was pushed shut again. 46 had made it through in this batch. As I turned to record the number, (we collect data and report it to UN agencies) I saw Jane still standing in exactly the same spot. She still smiled but looked more tense now. I encouraged her to move forward but I could see she was reluctant to be swallowed up in the crowd. I made several attempts to get the attention of one of the soldiers standing inside the large open security cage where they survey the mass of humanity waiting to be let through from the "other side." I thought I might be able to appeal to his good nature to facilitate the progress of a mother with a very sick baby in her arms, a pregnant mother fearful of joining the crush, an elderly man bent almost double, a woman suffering from liver cancer who could barely stand and the little six year old just wanting to go to school.             

All my efforts were quite deliberately ignored. This group of soldiers, unlike some who do try to help the most vulnerable, appeared to have their own agenda and helping the weak did not surface as a priority. A short time later a large American man with few signs of any disability flashed his American passport and shouted "I am an American citizen." The "humanitarian" gate was re-opened and he made his unobstructed way through! 

The "humanitarian" lane was opened another six times in the following hour allowing 17, 28, 18, 14, 65, 56 people through but despite encouragement still no progress for Jane, who was never able to push her way to the front. Eventually, as the crowds became less she accepted help from a Palestinian woman and was nearly at the gate ready to go to the next checking stage, when there was an announcement that the "humanitarian" gate would not be open again for some time and most of the soldiers went off duty leaving just the one who can operate the main turnstiles remotely from the safety of his bullet proof cabin. My last glimpse, of a now tearful Jane, was as she and the woman who had befriended her made their way towards the main turnstiles. She had been waiting over one hour and 30 minutes at this stage and I estimated it would take her at least as long again to make it through all the stages of the checking process at Qalandyia to the bus on the other side. Three hours of waiting, wondering, hoping and being checked for a six year old to make it to school. What possible threat could she be to Israel's national security I thought; could anyone possibly see her as a potential terrorist ?

Around the time Jane would have reached the bus on the Israeli side of the checkpoint, the long queues in the waiting shed on the Palestinian side had gone and the noise had died down, so my colleague and I decided to call it a day and we joined the orderly queue now forming through the 80 cm wide lanes to make our way back to Jerusalem. Having got through the turnstiles, we then had to queue again for the scanning process and passport and ID checking. I checked my watch - it was 9 am. The distance to the bus is possibly 50 m. The progress through the next set of turnstiles was painfully slow. One man due to have an operation that morning was sent back because his permit was not in "order." He had to queue again at the DCO office to get it rectified. As I stood in line at booth 4, I spoke to many Palestinians and watched two very young soldiers, possibly 18 or 19 years old, treat them with utter contempt.  The young woman asked every individual, "Do you speak English?" and "What is the Arabic word for fingers."  (All Palestinians from the West Bank need to show their ID card, their permit giving them permission to come to Israel for a specified purpose and they have to have their hand print scanned.) She was making the process as long as possible. "She is just having a laugh," said a kind Palestinian man who had obviously seen it all many times before. Her colleague, who should have been checking bags going through the scanner, was lying almost horizontally, blowing smoke into the air. People placed their bags, metal objects, belts etc. on the conveyor belt but as he took long breaks for his smoking ritual it was not always switched on, so we had to stand and wait at the other side for our belongings. Eventually it was switched on, my bag arrived and I caught bus number 78 back to Jerusalem. It was 10.05 am. I was "lucky." It only took me an hour. Palestinians travelling earlier could have spent 3 to 4 hours here.

As the bus weaved its way through the traffic to Jerusalem I wondered how Jane fared in school today and was she able to learn? If the man had eventually made it to the hospital for his operation? If the young soldiers were really as callous or ignorant as they appeared? If the Israeli public is aware of the brutalising nature of the occupation on its own young people? And perhaps most of all, when will it all end? Hopefully, such inhumanity is never sustainable.