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Text testimonies Aren’t there people who just want to work?
catalog number: 83454
Rank: First Sergeant
Unit: Paratroopers
categories:
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Aren’t there people who just want to work?
Rank: First Sergeant
Unit: Paratroopers

It was the first checkpoint in my life. At first they tell you, “They only cross with permission from Civil Administration.” Okay, you’re there, here’s the first person. You ask, “Have you got permission from Civil Administration?” “No.” “Then what have you got?” “Student ID.” You say, “Wait, in principle he’s not allowed through, but so what, let’s ask.” You get on the radio, you ask the guy in the company operations room. Who’s in the company operations room? ——, the company clerk. You ask the company clerk, “Listen, someone with a student ID, do they go through or not?” She doesn’t know. She calls the brigade operations room, they must know. Who’s in the brigade operations room? The operations sergeant. Does the operations sergeant know? She doesn’t know. She has to ask the officer. So she asks ——, the operations officer. The operations officer doesn’t know, but because he’s the operations officer he can’t let on that he doesn’t know, so he says, “Yes, someone with a student ID can pass.” Okay, fine, you can let someone with a student ID go through . . . Someone else comes, you ask, “Have you got permission from Civil Administration?” “No, but I’ve got a teacher’s license.” Wait, if you let someone through with a student ID, then what, shouldn’t you be able to go with a teacher’s license? But I don’t know, so I ask. I ask ——, again, —— doesn’t know. —— calls ——. Just then ——, the operations officer who was in some meeting, shows up, so —— says, “Okay, if you let someone through with a student ID, then someone with a teacher’s license can pass.” Of course, you don’t know all this, it’s only after the fact, when you do your turn in the operations room, that you get it. So you accept it, you say, okay, some people can pass, some can’t. Who decides? The operations sergeants decide who can cross and who can’t. And that’s when you’re still young and you listen to them. Slowly you realize that no one who comes to the checkpoint is going to say, “Listen, I just want to cross. I just want to cross because, I don’t know, I want to cross the checkpoint, I want to go over there.” Either he’s sick, or he’s a student, or he’s a teacher, or he’s from the Red Cross, or he’s from UNWRA. They pull out papers, scribbles, until you realize, the penny drops. It hit me after a month, isn’t it a bit weird? Aren’t there any ordinary people in the Territories? Aren’t there people who just want to cross? No, everyone’s either sick, or this, or that.