CPTnet
9 September 2005

HEBRON: A second day of confrontation, anger, doubt and fear at checkpoint

by Jerry Levin

Thursday 8 September school routines were severely disrupted when Ibrahimi
Boys School teachers joined teachers from nearby Al Fayhaa Girls School in
refusing to file through electronic metal detecting equipment. The sensing
device is inside a caravan at a newly created checkpoint blocking access to
streets leading to the schools. Contrary to expectations, soldiers at the
caravan told the girls' school teachers that unlike the day before when
soldiers had allowed them to avoid the examination, their commanding officer
had told them that this morning all must follow the new procedure.

Besides repeating their (errroneous) anxiety from the day before that the
X-ray device was capable of compromising female privacy, the women, one of
whom is pregnant, also claimed that the equipment can cause cancer. Despite
attempts by CPTers John Lynes and Jerry Levin to get the soldiers to allow
the teachers and their students to circumvent the electronic sensing devices
again, the soldiers adamantly refused.

Then suddenly and unaccountably one of the soldiers allowed the girls to
pass through an adjacent barricade but not the teachers. By this time,
however, seven male teachers from Ibrahimi Boys School in solidarity with
their eleven female colleagues also refused to submit to the electronic
examination and stood with them outside the caravan (trailer.)

The stand off drew a crowd of curious onlookers as well as three
Palestinian news photographers, TIPH and CPTers Dianne Roe and Christina
Gibb. It lasted from about 7:15 to almost 10:00 a.m.. The Palestinians were
always calm, quiet, and orderly despite their concerns. Six Israeli soldiers
in a backup patrol stayed relatively calm but were also tense, as, rifles at
the ready, they joined the soldiers stationed at the check point, who still
firmly refused to accede to the teachers' demand.

Finally a few minutes before 10:00, soldiers and teachers reached a
compromise. The women allowed a soldier with a metal detecting wand to wave
it over them one by one in the street --not inside the caravan --as they
approached and then passed through the opening in the barricade. The men
however refused saying that they would rather conduct school in the street
than submit.

A spokesperson for the teachers said, "We are not satisfied with this
arrangement. But we have made a point." Asked what they would do when
school resumes on Saturday, she said, "We don't know now. We will meet later
to decide about that."