Sirs,I read with interest your article on Palestinians, checkpoints and Israel.
As an Israeli living in Efrat, one of the Jewish towns mentioned in your article, I felt I personally related to the description of the humiliation, delays, and inconvenience caused by the various checkpoints.
Let me describe my typical day.
Efrat should normally be a 7 minute drive to Jerusalem, yet when I leave for work I have to drive through 2 checkpoints to enter Jerusalem, often sitting in traffic for as long as a half hour, as each car is checked one by one to make sure no Palestinian suicide bombers sneak through.
Before heading to work, I stop off at the post office to get my mail. At the post office, I empty my pockets, walk through a metal detector, and as I invariably beep, I then face the daily humiliation of the pat down (like when you are at the airport), I usually then show my ID – all to make sure that I am not a Palestinian terrorist planning to shoot up everyone inside the building - again.
Having completed that checkpoint I head over to work. Entering the building's parking lot, my car is then thoroughly searched to make sure no bombs are smuggled inside or attached unbeknownst to me (oh, and I show my ID yet again).
Entering the lobby requires that once again I show my ID. If it is a nice guard that knows me, he'll sometimes skip the humiliating pat down if I beep as I walk through the metal detector.
In the evening, if I want to go shopping with my wife and then catch dinner and a movie, the checkpoints and humiliations become nearly unbearable.
Entering the shopping mall parking lot in Talpiot, our car is once again thoroughly checked for bombs, and depending on the day's warning level, I might have to get out of the car and undergo yet another humiliating pat down (and of course show my ID).
Entering the supermarket, once again I empty my pockets, and get the pat down, my wife has the additional humiliation of not just a pat down, but of some stranger rummaging though her pocketbook and seeing what she keeps in there. Once again, to make sure we are not Palestinian terrorists smuggling in weapons to kill innocent Israelis in a public place – yet again.
Having completed our shopping we head to a restaurant, where yet again, we undergo a full body pat down, and to my wife's humiliation yet again, her pocketbook is rummaged through, all to make sure that we are not yet another Palestinian suicide bomber trying to blow up yet another restaurant and all the Jews inside.
Do I need to describe what happens when then head over to the movie theater?
I probably should, because there we are checked 3 times, as they make sure that the previous guard didn't misidentify us at any point.
Luckily, when we head back home there are no spot checks on the road today and even better, the guard at the checkpoint to our town recognizes us, so we go through unhindered.
As he opens the huge metal gate attached to the wall that surrounds my town, which protect us from Palestinian infiltrators, I feel like I'm entering a big prison.
Prison-like or not, usually our town's security fence works. In the past few years, only 3 Palestinian terrorist got through, but thank God they were killed in time before their attacks actually succeeded.
Though the truth is, the Palestinian suicide bomber in our supermarket only failed because the trigger to his suicide belt malfunctioned when he pressed it.
So I must say, I do relate to the fact that my Palestinian neighbors must go through so many checkpoints, yet not as many as I go through every day.Unfortunately, unless the Palestinians unequivocally give up terrorism, both their checkpoints, and my checkpoints are here to stay.
Tomorrow I am renewing my ID card. It's worn out.
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