By Elias Zananiri/The Media Line

[Ramallah] Restlessly, Mohammad stood at the cashier’s desk in one of Ramallah’s supermarkets. He was the third in a line of about seven people who had just filled their shopping carts and were waiting to pay their bills. The first man had just finished, and the second in the line had half his cart full of items. The cashier scanned the price tags via the barcode reader. The customer closely monitored the bill sum and, at one point, looked down at the cashier and said: “Stop, please. I need to take some items back to their shelves. The counter shows that I reached the 500-shekel limit that I can use.” The cashier, a nice-looking woman in her late 20s, was embarrassed. She was alone. Her colleague had left for the morning half-hour break.