[travel Israeli security fail

[mattbell]

Israel spends a huge amount of money on security. They treat train stations, bus stations, malls, and even some restaurants the way we treat airports. However, there are high value targets and not-so-high-value targets, and resources are limited. Apparently the Lev Hamifratz train station is in the latter category.

Security officer: (at entrance to train station) Passport please.

He looks at the passport... he starts looking really concerned when he sees the United Arab Emirates stamp, complete with scary-looking (pretty) Arabic script.

Me: I went to Dubai.
SO: That's what this is? U.A.E. ?
Me: Yes.

He keeps looking.

SO: WHAT'S THIS?? YOU WENT TO SYRIA??
Me: No, I didn't go to Syria. That's Turkey.
SO: That's not Syria?
Me: No, that's a Turkey visa. That's the Turkish flag. It says “Turkey” right there.
SO: Where's your Israel immigration stamp?
Me: Over here. Ben-Gurion airport.
SO: Oh, ok. Go ahead.

Comments

[klrmn.livejournal.com]

they're asking for passports now? *boggles*

(remind me to tell you the story of my reaction to an *american* airport security person asking to search my bag)

[proctologiste.livejournal.com]

Well, they ask or ID. Israelis have ID cards, but if you're foreign, passport is what you've gotta show.

[klrmn.livejournal.com]

*nod*
i have an israeli id, but as of when i left, that wasn't part of the rigamarole when i left.

[proctologiste.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I moved to the US in 2000, and when I visited again last December I had to go through a full check when going into a train station in Tel Aviv.

Levels of security are different at different stations. When I got off at Herzliya there was no security there.

[klrmn.livejournal.com]

i moved back in 03, and they had installed xray machines in the new central bus station in jerusalem, but they did not apper to be using them all of the time yet.

[easwaran.livejournal.com]

I just double-checked, and the Syrian flag is not at all similar to the Turkish one except that it has some red on it. But it's got white and black and two green stars, as opposed to being all red with a star and crescent.

[proctologiste.livejournal.com]

I have no idea what caused this guy to confuse them, but I can see how one can conceivably confuse the names of the two countries when written in hebrew. In phonetic transcription:
surya and turkya.

[frogpyjamas.livejournal.com]

He wasn't confused, he was trying to get you to admit you had been to Syria/ find out if you had been in Syria while in Turkey. A common trick of international security agents.

[nasu-dengaku.livejournal.com]

It's conceivable he was playing dumb, but he would have had to be very good at it -- watching his face, he had the confused pimply-guy-i'll-have-to-ask-my-manager look