Left: After they reached as far as they realised they would be able to go, students got out of their buses and walked through the final part of Ramallah towards Jerusalem. They were joined by Ramallan residents, the group now numbering around 800 in total. Photo by Yasser Darweesh

They were heading towards the permanent Israeli checkpoint on the southern edge of Ramallah, where Palestinian-controlled Area "A" meets Israeli-controlled Area "C".

Israelis call this checkpoint the "Arak checkpoint", the name stemming from a nearby factory that distills Arak, a Palestinian liquor. Palestinians similarly name the area Al-Khammara. In reality, the actual name of the area is Ma'alufiyyeh, after the Ma'aluf family that owns much of it.

Right: A burning tire rolls towards an Israeli soldier. Photo by Yasser Darweesh. When the demonstrators arrived at the checkpoint, they set fire to tyres and began collecting stones for the coming confrontation. All of this is pretty standard for these face-to-face manifestations of the conflict.

In this photo, you can see the street littered with stones around the soldier. This does not necessarily mean that he was in this area when they were thrown. Standard practice is for the soldiers to stand back out of harm's way, keeping the demonstrators at bay with a mixture of teargas and rubber or plastic-coated metal bullets.

Within this framework, soldiers sporadically run forward to shoot and get a better aim before retreating.

Left: Israeli soldiers taking cover from stones prepare to go into action. The white signs on their chest say, "Police" as these in fact are the mishmar gvuul ("border guards" in Hebrew). For all intents and purposes, we think of these "police" as soldiers. Photo by Yasser Darweesh.

Palestinians are wary of this Israeli division because their training is acknowledged to be better than regular army training. You will see these units in East Jerusalem and the rest of the occupied territories.

The M-16 rifles they carry can fire rubber/plastic-coated metal bullets and teargas cannisters from attachable accessories in addition, of course, to live ammunition.

At this point in the day, everything has progressed pretty much as normal as far as clashes are concerned. I was up at the university during point and recieved reports on the events from several eyewitnesses, including Yasser Darweesh, university photographer and Public Relations Office employee. I was to arrive in this area later in the day.