Urban Art Association

BONGO DOES NOT WANT TO BE RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY PROBLEMS

BUT BONGO THINKS YOU MUST UNDERSTAND THAT IF YOU ARE NOT CONVERSANT WITH ENTERING SOMEWHERE AS CONTENTIOUS AS THIS, THEN MAYBE BEING HONEST IS THE BEST WAY.

TRAVEL LIGHT

HAVE ALL THE PAPERWORK YOU NEED TO HAND

BE PLEASANT AND OPEN

I think u took the last trollies! It was sold out yesterday afternoon...

You don't have to lie.

If like me you traveled to the airport from Tel Aviv and they say
Were have you come from then say Tel Aviv.
When asked why have you been visiting I just said Tourism.
I don't think by saying what I said I was lying just be direct and to the point, say as little as possible.

But I suppose if you have come straight from Bethlehem thats another matter

Cheers GOZGOZ and safe flight home

Flew into Tel Aviv this morning. Seems El Al have a remit to heavily search anyone who vaguely looks like they may be going to SG or on a 'solidarity mission'. The chap I was sitting with at the gate in Heathrow had an "authorised graffiti area" sticker on his Mac and had some very impressive zoom lenses on him.... Tho I had no such paraphernalia, I was wearing skinny jeans and yellow trainers. So... got absolutely everything I own swabbed down by what the security chap described as an electronic sniffer dog "except it doesn't have to shit". Somehow they missed the fact I was carrying a present for someone in the form of a leather coin purse shaped like a grenade. El Al are losing their touch.
Ho hum.

Heading to the Ghetto tomo...and prob going back on Weds and Thurs.... You can avoid the checkpoint if you drive in from Jerusalem via Beit Jala. Then again, I've done this too many times -- the novelty of checkpoints has worn off. It's worth the 'experience' tho. Gonna see if shooting some video will work on this forum...if not will post you tube links. Also brought a stills camera.

If you're here anytime between now and Fri morning, PM me.

Ah...and do visit the falafel shop on Manger Sq. The only one that won't give you the runs.

BONGO NOTES THAT EL AL WILL SINGLE OUT NON ISRAELI PASSPORT HOLDERS AND SUBJECT THEM TO QUESTIONING AND SWABBING - THIS IS NORMAL FOR EL AL - BONGO THINKS THIS IS NOT SURPRISING GIVEN PROBGLEMS IN 1970'S WITH HIJACKINGS.

THIS IS WHY EL AL IS THE ONLY STATE AIRLINE IN THE WORLD TO STILL PROVIDE METAL KNIVES AND FORLS AS STANDARD

BONGO ALSO ADVISES THAT IF YOU DISCOUNT THE POLITICS OF TRAVELLING ON THE ISRAEL STATE ARILINE, YOU WILL FIND THAT YOU WILL NOT HAVE TO QUEUE AS EL AL ARE THE ONLY AIRLINE WITH THEIR OWN DESIGNATED DEPARTURE CHANNEL AT MAJOR AIRPORTS AND ARE USUALLY SPEEDY

The trip that Alsbaba, Hoops, Ed & I took was on such a tight turn-around (9 hours) from landing in Tel Aviv to flying out the only way to try to avoid detention at the airport was to be economical with the truth. Had we been doing an overnighter this would have been a whole different set of circumsatnces. The very fact that ,due to time constraints, we HAD to come directly form Bethlehem was the cause of our problems. Most of you will not be doing this trip in such a short space of time and will not have the pressure that this brought.

Bang on, Bongo! That's exactly the same experience seidbereit had when he travelled to great mate's wedding in faraway Tel Aviv a few years ago.

Flew from Berlin, where the El Al terminal has a tank standing in front of the entrance permanently - unless there's an El Al flight taking off (and there's only a few a day) when the tank "accompanies" the plane right up to the runway.

You may not have to queue, as you say, but (and I can only speak for Berlin Schönefeld airport) you need to be at the airport at least three hours before take off.

Each passenger checks in at their own separate desk (there were about 15 desks for our flight) which is manned by an Israeli soldier who searched the bags and a Mossad agent who questioned me for close to an hour, during which he continuously went back and forth to some people working on computers to have his notes entered. He even checked out the wedding invitation I had with me (which the people on the computers had held onto for most of the interview) to see if the wedding was actually taking place by phoning the hotel in Tel Aviv.

Right at the end of the grilling he came back from the people with the computers (who must have typed in at least an A4 page of notes), and completely caught me by surprise by saying "I can not work out why an Irishman is going the to the wedding of a German national and a Belgian national in Tel Aviv. Please explain this to me" He'd even checked out who the wedding party was and where they were from!!

Luckily the question was easy to answer but I couldn't help feeling like a criminal simply because of the way he was thinking and probing... still took ten minutes of repetitions of old questions before he finally said we were done and I could go though... I've never experienced anything like it in my life before or since. That whole week was a complete eye-opener for me - I really wish I had the time to go back now!

Anyway, the long and short is, you need to be prepared for some really pressing questions if your passport ain't an Israeli one (or, as in my case, if it's one which is a little unhelpful in making you look less suspect as an Irish one appears to be) and to be prepared to probably sit through a longish interview and maybe have the odd near-touching-cloth experience along the way.

How long did you get questioned for Bongo and was it soldiers and Mossad or just normal check-in staff?

(My apologies to the entire forum if the above story bored you to tears, Bongo's point simply unleashed a long forgotten (repressed probably) memory, so please don't neg me to kingdom come - thanks)

That tale I just told above was from way before 9/11 so I'd be really interested to see how much tighter the security has got since then, but that said surely there's only a certain amount of checking / grilling / searching you can expect people to reasonably put up with before it starts to put people off flying there. You have to remember I was carrying a wedding invitation which they knew was completely legit and yet I was STILL subjected to an hour of questions and feeling like a terrorist.

Do you think having a military ID from a western country, say the US or the UK would help or hurt your progress?

skinny jeans and yellow trainers and a hand grenade purse.. mate, that'd pretty much get your arrested anywhere, not sure about meeting up now. ha ha ;D

jus messin.. got in.. three arches is excellent, cheers for the tip.. all good. Heading out for food.

definitely help if its real! If its fake and you get caught, then definitely hurt!

Good point, it was nothing unexpected.. to expect a walk through is mad considering the history of El Al. Had worse interrogations coming from Amsterdam. All good, falafals here I come

In my opinion, I thought the Israeli security at Tel Aviv was over the top and unwarranted. To treat everyone like a potential terrorist, what kind of paranoid country is that???

They dont have any comprehension as to why people would travel to Bethlehem for Santas Ghetto, more to the point they dont have any comprehension as to why anyone would want to travel to Bethlehem. The propoganda they use is echoed by the way the treat westerners who visit their country.

I echo also Scottyd's comments, if you think being honest is the best policy, then make sure you have no contact with any Palestinians, ie taxi drivers. We went with good intentions, kept an open mind about both sides, but I know which side of the barrier were the friendlier, more welcoming, and less paranoid.