Barta’a-Reihan
7:20-7:50 Tura – Shaked
As soon as we arrived a soldier and a DCL representative approached us: Who are you, what you are doing here, why, you are not allowed to be here, and so on. The angry DCL guy left pretty quickly and the other soldier relaxed after getting a brief explanation about us (he had never heard about us).
Very little traffic in either direction, no delays, the people who pass say everything is fine. They repeat the request to open the checkpoint earlier than 7am.
An elderly, sick man approaches us, he speak Hebrew fluently and tells us that his son is a policeman in Barta'a (if we understood correctly), he was sentenced to 2 months in prison at Megiddo Jail, on charges of throwing stones at 2 am at the checkpoint. A policeman from Barta'a? How did the rocks get from Barta'a to the checkpoint? The man is 27-year-old, married with one child. Sounds unlikely. The guy should be released in ten days and therefore we weren’t asked to do anything about it, but the father said: this is how one creates the spark that would start the fire from the bottom.
The dumpster is still full and overflowing and there is garbage all over the place.
8:00- 8:30 Barta’a – Reihan
In the parking lot, close to the entrance to the terminal, they erected a shed for the people waiting for their rides. Ameliorating occupation. Heavy traffic, but relatively less than usual. Only one window is operating at the terminal and you can see that there is a queue of people waiting, but it moves quickly. One person told us that it took him 15 minutes to pass the checkpoint. Another one says that Charlie, the checkpoint commander, imposed on him 2 months prevention from crossing the checkpoint (I'm not sure I remember correctly the length of prevention), for "talking back and shouting at a soldier." He lives in the West Bank but works at Barta'a and now his livelihood is denied. We gave him Sylvia’s contact details, hoping she could help.
Barta’a-Reihan Checkpoint
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This checkpoint is located on the Separation Fence route, east of the Palestinian town of East Barta’a. The latter is the largest Palestinian community inside the seam-line zone (Barta’a Enclave) in the northern West Bank. Western Barta’a, inside Israel, is adjacent to it. The Checkpoint is open all week from 5 a.m. to 9 p.m. Since mid-May 2007, the checkpoint has been managed by a civilian security company subordinate to the Ministry of Defense. People permitted to cross through this checkpoint into and from the West Bank are residents of Palestinian communities inside the Barta’a Enclave as well as West Bank Palestinian residents holding transit permit. Jewish settlers from Hermesh and Mevo Dotan cross here without inspection. A large, modern terminal is active here with 8 windows for document inspection and biometric tests (eyes and fingerprints). Usually only one or two of the 8 windows are in operation. Goods, up to medium commercial size, may pass here from the West Bank into the Barta’a Enclave. A permanent registered group of drives who have been approved by the may pass with farm produce. When the administration of the checkpoint was turned over to a civilian security firm, the Ya’abad-Mevo Dotan Junction became a permanent checkpoint. . It is manned by soldiers who sit in the watchtower and come down at random to inspect vehicles and passengers (February 2020).
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