Qalandiya - a story of wounded procedures
As it were, a routine event that is not to be noticed or related.
For what is extraordinary when a wounded victim of a traffic accident is taken to the hospital?
But occupation has its own rules. It makes its marks on people subjugated to it, marks people above and below.
The tool that separates people is the ID that occupation has provided.
Green IDs for those without any rights, blue IDs for those with relative rights.
Understanding the differences in status and IDs is crucial to understanding an event such as a traffic accident.
So this is what happened:
An ambulance arrived at the Qalandiya checkpoint, carrying a victim of a traffic accident near Kufr Aqab. A frontal collision of two vehicles. So how come only one of them was rushed to the hospital by ambulance?
The answer is not the severity of the wounding but the color of the ID.
The victim arriving in an ambulance, fixed to his stretcher, holds a blue ID and is defined as a resident of Jerusalem (non-citizen), and taken to Hadassah Hospital not because of his wounds or the proximity to the hospital, but simply and only because of the color of his ID.
Kuf Aqab is 2 kilometers from Ramallah, so its hospital is the closest to the site of the accident, and good sense would have the victim’s health demand to be taken directly there without losing time nor shaking the wounded body as is done at the Qalandiya checkpoint when the wounded person changes ambulances (to say nothing of the hundreds of NIS that the family spends on the services of two ambulance companies).
In fact, the victim’s upper class compared to Palestinian non-residents of Jerusalem actually did him a disservice.
This was the fate of Covid-19 patients during the pandemic, when Israeli emergency services were afraid or simply did not want to cross the apartheid wall and evacuate patients from the quasi-Jerusalem neighborhoods, which eventually led to the neglect and death of quite a few people.
And what happened to the other victims of that traffic accident? They must have been taken in a hurry to a Ramallah hospital.
In actual fact, this is not a story about a wounded person, but about wounded procedures…
Qalandiya Checkpoint / Atarot Pass (Jerusalem)
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Click here to watch a video from Qalandiya checkpoint up to mid 2019 Three kilometers south of Ramallah, in the heart of Palestinian population. Integrates into "Jerusalem Envelope" as part of Wall that separates between northern suburbs that were annexed to Jerusalem in 1967: Kafr Aqab, Semiramis and Qalandiya, and the villages of Ar-Ram and Bir Nabala, also north of Jerusalem, and the city itself. Some residents of Kafr Aqab, Semiramis and Qalandiya have Jerusalem ID cards. A terminal operated by Israel Police has functioned since early 2006. As of August 2006, northbound pedestrians are not checked. Southbound Palestinians must carry Jerusalem IDs; holders of Palestinian Authority IDs cannot pass without special permits. Vehicular traffic from Ramallah to other West Bank areas runs to the north of Qalandiya. In February 2019, the new facility of the checkpoint was inaugurated aiming to make it like a "border crossing". The bars and barbed wire fences were replaced with walls of perforated metal panels. The check is now performed at multiple stations for face recognition and the transfer of an e-card. The rate of passage has improved and its density has generally decreased, but lack of manpower and malfunctions cause periods of stress. The development and paving of the roads has not yet been completed, the traffic of cars and pedestrians is dangerous, and t the entire vicinity of the checkpoint is filthy. In 2020 a huge pedestrian bridge was built over the vehicle crossing with severe mobility restrictions (steep stairs, long and winding route). The pedestrian access from public transport to the checkpoint from the north (Ramallah direction) is unclear, and there have been cases of people, especially people with disabilities, who accidentally reached the vehicle crossing and were shot by the soldiers at the checkpoint. In the summer of 2021, work began on a new, sunken entrance road from Qalandiya that will lead directly to Road 443 towards Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. At the same time, the runways of the old Atarot airport were demolished and infrastructure was prepared for a large bus terminal. (updated October 2021)
Tamar FleishmanFeb-27-2026Qalandiya: On the way to prayer
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