‘Some will wake up at two or three in the morning just to make sure they get through the checkpoint and to work on time’
The checkpoint is an intimidating place, especially during the commuter rush. The gates and turnstiles are often closed for long periods, trapping people in narrow corridors. This can make the short journey through the checkpoint last a couple of hours. It’s an uncomfortable place to be, and EAs have witnessed people passing out in the line.
On a day like this I met Nadeer, who was on the way to his construction job in Israel. Nadeer has two degrees from Bethlehem University and a master’s degree from Bahrain University. He comes to the checkpoint at 4am every morning and travels to Israel to work as a manual labourer. In the West Bank he can’t earn enough to support his pregnant wife and two young daughters.
‘The Israeli buses will wait until 6am at the latest… They don’t care if we get on them or not, after that they will leave’
If Nadeer can’t get onto the bus, he will lose a day’s work and return home to his family empty handed. When I met Nadeer it was 5:30am and the checkpoint gates, including the humanitarian gate, had been closed for nearly half an hour. The humanitarian gate, which is for the elderly, women, children, and people with disabilities or illnesses, is rarely opened. On one occasion, at 5am, when the main line was crowded, I tried to persuade soldiers to open the gate for a ten-year-old girl on her way to hospital with her mother. They refused.