more pictures of people trying to reach Friday prayers

Ok, I confess to being a little fixated on this topic. Anne Paq's blog has 2 posts of pictures from the Bethlehem checkpoint into Jerusalem, here and here. Her website is full of moving, emotional pictures of Palestine too. The active stills site is also excellent. I hope they will forgive me for posting 2 of my favorites from last week. I love the way she caught the shadows in this one. I want to take pictures like this.

The checkpoint is gone!?!

When my husband told me they Israelis were removing the checkpoint between where we live and Ramallah yesterday, I thought he was joking, but they really did it. Honestly, I would not be surprised if they put it back later, but I hope it stays gone at least until after Ramadan. When was the last time it was possible to get from Bir Nabala to Ramallah without passing a checkpoint? Years and years. Before they put up the wall and this new checkpoint, we used to go to Ramallah through the Qalandia checkpoint. That checkpoint has been there since the mid 90's, although at first it was not always manned. Of course we still can't get to Jerusalem or even upper Beit Haninah without passing Qalandia. But at least I can get to the town of Ram without passing a checkpoint, which I used to be a 25 minute walk. It still will be a much longer trip, but you have no idea what a relief it will be to not have to go through that checkpoint. And, a certain friend of mine has refused to visit me for months because the last time she came here, her car was damaged by the way the checkpoint forced the Ramallah bound traffic to swerve around rocks and drop off the pavement at the checkpoint. So I expect a visit now M!

http://ca.reuters.com/article/topNews/idCALL14394220080821

BIR NABALA, West Bank (Reuters) - Israel, under international pressure to ease restrictions on Palestinians, removed a checkpoint in the occupied West Bank on Thursday that had curbed movement outside a main Palestinian city.

The move came ahead of a planned visit by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice next week to continue to push Israelis and Palestinians to pursue talks Washington has hoped could lead to a peace deal by early next year.

An Israeli military spokesman said soldiers had been instructed to remove concrete blocks and a checkpoint where soldiers inspected traffic leading to Bir Nabala, a town near Ramallah, where the Palestinian government sits.

It was the third such checkpoint Israel has removed this month, meeting requests from the U.S. and Middle East envoy Tony Blair to help peace moves and to bolster Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's Western-backed government.

Tawfiq Nabali, head of the Bir Nabala village council, said the checkpoint that was lifted had restricted movement for more than 50,000 Palestinians living in 15 villages near Ramallah.

"We welcome any step in which the Israeli occupation leaves us alone, living in dignity without checkpoints and racism," Nabali told Reuters.

Palestinians say hundreds of Israeli roadblocks erected in the past eight years in occupied territory stifle their economy and amount to collective punishment.

Israel, which placed most of the barriers after a Palestinian uprising erupted in 2000 when peace talks failed, says the measures are necessary to prevent suicide bombers from reaching its cities.

(Additional reporting By Mohammed Assadi in Ramallah)

(Reporting by Ammar Awad, Writing by Avida Landau and Allyn Fisher-Ilan, Editing by Michael Winfrey)