Whether a Friday in occupied Hebron will be a calm and relatively pleasant one, or stressful and difficult... or in some cases, even deadly... depends a lot on the Israeli Border Police and Army. Last Friday, the Border Police manning the checkpoint outside the mosque were in a relaxed mood and let people pass without stopping anyone for the most part. Even the people who were stopped were stopped for a short while and let go, all the while being treated courteously.
Today we stood at a different part pf the checkpoint, and noticed that the different personnel manning it evidently felt they had something to prove.
In what I call "the cage", through which Palestinians must enter to go into the mosque to pray, there was a very stressful environment today. Two burly Border Police officers stood beside the cage, talking loudly to people and randomly stopping them and forcing them to hand over their documents or empty their pockets. Other officers, sitting in booths, observed the show. Sometimes they let the line move quickly, other times they stopped it and let in only one person at a time. One man was randomly stopped and told to go back. He would not be able to pray in the mosque this morning. No chance to argue his case, permission simply denied and that was it,
They were acting in an aggressive fashion, and several times ordered me to stop filming. I pretended not to understand and at times lowered the camera, but of course later continued. As human rights monitors, it is our job to capture these situations. The camera is our weapon, and it is no wonder that some fear it so much.
Palestinians, when going to pray in the Ibrahimi Mosque, never know what mood the soldiers are in or what their orders are. These things, as well as many other factors that are beyond their control will determine whether they get to prayer on time, or at all.
After prayers ended and the worshipers filed back, on our way back to our apartment we ran into a group of Israeli soldiers going on patrol in the Souq. The four soldiers decided today for some reason that a walk down the street was not enough, and they needed to practice other things.
They entered three Palestinian homes, walking in of course without asking for permission or knocking. The people in them looked at them in confusion but of course did not dare say anything. The soldiers spent some time in each one and then walked out, talking among themselves.
When I asked them why they are entering Palestinian homes, I was told it is "not my business" and when I was not filming, another soldier told me I was "pissing him off".
I could have asked him if he is "pissed off" how does he think the Palestinians feel, and could have also pointed out to him that if he and his friends weren't entering people's homes uninvited, there would have been no reason for us to confront them about it and the he would not be "pissed off". Sometimes though it is best to hold one's tongue, and I just continued filming.
Eventually, they left the market and went to the Synagogue.
It is possible that this was part of training. Israeli soldiers sometimes train their arrest and "security" skills on live civilians. Whereas many other armies would hire people to act as 'enemy civilians', the Israeli Army often just uses unsuspecting Palestinian civilians, in Hebron especially.
Before what we call "Mosque Patrol" even started, I learned from Jamal, a good Palestinian friend and shopkeeper, that the Army on Thursday night removed a protective, strong iron grate that was put up by TIPH on the request of Palestinians, to stop settlers from throwing things down at them from their windows. The soldiers did this on the request of the settlers, saying, according to Jamal's friend, that the barrier was a "security threat".
They allegedly feared that a Palestinian may somehow get on it and walk up to the window of a settler home and throw in a rock or molotov cocktail through that window. How such a feat would be possible in the Souq, which is under observation by heavily armed soldiers from their bases and towers, is really beyond me. Also, to get on this mesh a Palestinian would need to first get into the home of a settler family (who are armed) and then from the window jump onto the grate and walk on it to reach the windows of other settlers.
The grates are being taken down by the soldiers, on the request of the settlers and to the disappointment of the Palestinians in the Souq. Unfortunately, to the Israeli military and settlers, their opinions mean less than nothing.
Another Friday in Hebron.
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