Health violations are a major issue at checkpoints, where sick travelers and ambulances are often made to wait for hours on end. In addition, many checkpoints are closed overnight, so any rural Palestinian experiencing a health emergency after dark is essentially blocked from getting to a hospital. Perhaps the most striking anecdote I came across was that of Deir Ballut villager Lamis Qasim, who was seven months pregnant with twins when she began to go into labor in the middle of the night. Soldiers prevented her and her husband from driving past the village checkpoint to the nearest hospital in Ramallah. They even prevented her from walking across the checkpoint into an ambulance that could shuttle her to safety. The soldiers insisted that they were only following orders not to let anyone through at night. Two hours later, when she was finally let through, her premature babies were born alive in the ambulance, but both babies subsequently died because they couldn't get medical attention on time. Over 100 sick passengers have died at checkpoints, because they were prevented from seeking medical attention, a quarter of them children.
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