There’s something we did all the time that I think is bullshit. There’s a procedure called fishing net – if there’s information on a wanted person passing through our area, every available force deploys barriers on the road. We would get these warnings – the entire company pops out with a flying checkpoint. There was something almost daily. It was one of the things I hated most because we never managed to catch anyone with this fishing net.

On what is the warning based? I don’t know exactly from where the information comes. They would say: Fishing net activated, there’s some guy who’s supposed to travel from Ramallah to Bethlehem, that’s it, within the hour.

How long are the barriers in place? We would deploy the barriers until we got the go ahead from the operations room to lift it.

Is it totally blocked or do you check people and let them pass?

They’re checked, but you check every car, sometimes it creates shitty situations in which, for example, there’s a road in Area C (territory under full Israeli control), which is used by both settlers and Palestinians. Now the Israeli settlers are stuck in the traffic jam, surrounded by Palestinian cars, so they’re honking and cutting them off through the shoulders, and passing through the checkpoint not giving a shit about you. And I always felt uncomfortable that the Palestinians were stuck at the barrier and the settlers passed through, as if we are in the Wild West, or more accurately, South Africa.

What did you feel after a week or a month of doing this?That it’s bullshit. That it’s a waste of time, that it disrupts movement in the area, it disrupts Palestinians’ lives, disrupts settlers’ lives, disrupts my life.