‘Anin, Reihan, Shaked, Mon 17.8.09, Morning
Translation: Bracha B.A.
06:10 – A’anin Agricultural Checkpoint
The representative of the Liaison and Coordination Administration is not here. About 30 people are crowded near the middle gate. The inspections are being conducted by hand. Everyone going through is listed and after their permit is checked and a short inquisitive interview during which each person is asked to report where, why and what place they are going, and that information is noted on a piece of paper fluttering in the wind. This give an air of seriousness to the entire scene.
All the bags people are carrying are checked. Any packages inside the bags are suspected of being items for sale that are not permitted to bring across. This took place several times during the shift. Clarifying these things takes a long time and from a distance it appears to be harassment. By 6:30 only some of the people had gone through, and more continue to arrive.
The soldiers’ behavior at the checkpoint is not consistent and changes from one brigade to another. After the issue of children’s passage was clarified during our meeting with the head of the Liaison and Coordination Administration and in the field, the problem repeated itself. This shows to what degree the authorities of the occupation are concerned with the rights of the local residents, who are refugees in their own country and subject to random decrees of every young soldier and what he decides at the moment.
12- to 16-year old boys who are with their parents and have birth certificates are not allowed to go through. They are turned back one by one and their parents continue on without them, angry and resentful.
A particularly hostile soldier (orthodox, with a kippah and earlocks) is bothered by our presence. He checks occasionally and repeatedly warns us “You can’t cross the border.” At one point he drives the Hummer opposite us to separate us from the residents who are being checked by his comrades. We climb a hill and observe from there, ignoring him. Appeals to Adel, the head of the Liaison and Coordination Administration, and to Abbas do not help. We also left a message with a polite soldier at the Liaison and Coordination Administration, which did not help either.
At 07:00 the last of the tractors passed through after inspection and the checkpoint is locked.
07:15 Shaked-Tura CheckpointK. the representative from the Liaison and Coordination Administration, is not here.
Last week after the inspection in the booth was slower than usual, we were told that the reason was that a new brigade had arrived and they were being taught the procedures. Today we saw just how much this learning period helped.
Dozens of workers on their way to work in the seamline zone are waiting at the turnstile at the entrance to the inspection booth. ON the side where we are standing there are more than a dozen students or teachers on their way to the university in Jenin. The passage in unbearably slow. More people and children arrive all the time. People complain about the nerve-wracking slowness. “They are letting people in slowly, one by one.” “They are tossing aside I.D. cards with contempt.” With luck people finally emerge from the inspection booth.
When we ask why someone is being held, the soldier answers, “There are a lot of infiltrators who want to go through without documents, so we check really well.” We did not ask who the were the infiltrators and who were invaders in this place.
One of the residents coming out complains in Arabic while stuttering with excitement and anger. His friend translates and finally yells at us that “All of you are the same, you think that we are animals.” Others refuse to answer our questions and ignore our goodbyes. Their angry looks say everything.
08:10 We left. Many people were still waiting to enter the inspection booth.
08:20 The New Barta’a Checkpoint (Reihan)
Workers are arriving at the checkpoint at the rate of one taxi load every minute or two and disappear into the terminal. A few drivers are waiting for heaven knows what. It is hot and tiresome. People are talking about their difficulties before Ramadan and the beginning of the school year and ask for help in one form or another.
We buy olive oil from a friend and go up to the sleeve to observe people coming out. ON the way we declare the oil in the car. The security guards call Sharon, who sends us to the upper terminal to be checked. There, close to God, we are impressed by the surge of construction and investment in designing the place that is a source of pride for the State of Israel.
About 12 cars with their doors open are standing in the parking lot being checked by a security guard. The drivers watch us through the bars from the other side. In the inspection facility there are several vans waiting to be unloaded. Everything seems tired and weary. The dogs are quiet (there are six kennels) and sleeping before they are once again put into action in the afternoon. The proud dog landler is busy working in the nearby garden.
We wait several minutes for the end of the inspection. We received the oil, which to our relief was found to be acceptable.
08:50 We left the upper parking lot on our way out and did not continue to observe.
'Anin checkpoint (214)
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'Anin checkpoint (214)
'Anin checkpoint is located on the Separation Fence east of the Israeli community Mei Ami and close to the village of Anin in the West Bank. It is opened twice a week, morning and afternoon, on days with shorter light time, for Anin farmers whose olive groves have been separated from the village by the fence it became difficult to cultivate their land. Transit permits are only issued to those who can produce ownership documents for their caged-in land, and sometimes only to the head of the family or his widow, eldest son, and children. Sometimes the inheritors lose their right to tend to the family’s land. The permits are eked out and are re-issued only with difficulty. 55-year-old persons may cross the checkpoint (into Israel) without special permits. During the olive harvest season (about one month around October) the checkpoint is open daily and more transit permits are issued. Names of persons eligible to cross are held in the soldiers’ computers. In July 2007, a sweeping instruction was issued, stating that whoever does not return to the village through this checkpoint in the afternoon will be stripped of his transit permit when he shows up there next time. Since 2019, the checkpoint has not been allways locked with the seam-line zone gate (1 of 3 gates), and the fence around it has been broken in several sites.
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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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Tura-Shaked
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Tura-Shaked
This is a fabric of life* checkpoint through which pedestrians, cabs and private cars (since 2008) pass to and from the West Bank and the Seam-line Zone to and from the industrical zone near the settler-colony Shaked, schools and kindergartens, and Jenin university campuses. The checkpoint is located between Tura village inside the West Bank and the village of Dahar Al Malah inside the enclave of the Seam-line Zone. It is opened twice a day, between 7 a.m. and 10 a.m., and from 12 noon to 7 p.m. People crossing it (at times even kindergarten children) are inspected in a bungalow with a magnometer. Names of those allowed to cross it appear in a list held by the soldiers. Usually traffic here is scant.
- fabric of life roads and checkpoints, as defined by the Terminals Authority in the Ministry of Defense (fabric of life is a laundered name that does not actually describe any kind of humanitarian purpose) are intended for Palestinians only. These roads and checkpoints have been built on lands appropriated from their Palestinian owners, including tunnels, bypass roads, and tracks passing under bridges. Thus traffic can flow between the West Bank and its separated parts that are not in any kind of territorial contiguity with it. Mostly there are no permanent checkpoint on these roads but rather ‘flying’ checkpoints, check-posts or surprise barriers. At Toura, a small (less than one dunam) and sleepy checkpoint has been established, which has filled up with the years with nearly .every means of supervision and surveillance that the Israeli military occupation has produced. (February 2020)
Mar-21-2022Anin Checkpoint: A magnificent breach in the center of the checkpoint
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