There was a story about soldiers creating dirt barriers in the parking lot between Askar and Ein Bidan in Nablus. It’s a parking lot specially set aside for Palestinian public transportation and private vehicles. It’s something like three kilometers from Nablus. Based on a report, the soldiers got to the parking lot, and they shot in the air and told the Palestinians to leave the area. After all of the residents left, the soldiers built dirt mounds with a backhoe and blocked access to the parking lot. The army didn’t bother to check that there were no cars at the checkpoint. The backhoes came at four or five in the morning, they made dirt blockades. The Palestinian bus drivers came to the lot around seven or eight in the morning, and they had no way to get out. There were a lot of cars there, and whoever had a small car did what every Palestinian did, they bypassed the barrier. But the trucks and the buses, there was something like thirty vehicles there, they just couldn’t get out. So twenty private cars and three buses were stuck in the parking lot. By the way, one of the jeeps was still in the area.

Was it an army jeep, or the District Coordination and Liaison jeep? The army jeep. We even got the license plate number.

How did you get the details? The Palestinians saw the license plate.

Did you verify it? I couldn’t verify it, I did the primary investigation. Afterward, it became clear that the backhoe created a double barrier and hermetically sealed the area. The army claimed that all of the vehicles were able to get out, and the Palestinians claimed they couldn’t. In the end, the locals paid the workers to take down the barriers. But the trucks and three buses still couldn’t cross. They took down part of the barrier, and the private cars that were detained until 15:00 crossed at 18:37. The battalion sent word that it would send a team to open the barrier. At 22:39 it still wasn’t open, at 22:48 it still wasn’t open. At 22:48 they asked for permission to bring a private Palestinian backhoe to open it up.

Who brought it? The Palestinians brought it, they asked us for permission. The Palestinians lost a day of work. At seven o’clock the next morning they started opening the barriers, and at ten o’clock they crossed. A daylong story, started at eight or nine in the morning.

What was the reason for closing the parking lot? It had access to the village or something, I don’t know.