There was a norm of using your power to take all kinds of trinkets as souvenirs. This also struck me as wrong. Someone, one of the more aggressive guys, had a collection of prayer-bead strings with the names of Allah. Obviously if the driver gave it to the soldier, he could pass the inspection smoothly. If not, his car would be literally taken apart to check for explosive charges between the tire and the wheel… Often they simply gave in. Or food. Stuff like that. There was this box of sweetmeats. . . so it was worth the Palestinians' while to just give it to the soldier in return for their time. That really bothered me.

Were there incidents of bribery par-excellence? Money, property? Not so that I could take it to a court of law and have someone indicted, I don't think so, or perhaps there were and I don't know.