‘Anin, Reihan, Shaked, Thu 6.9.12, Afternoon
Translation: Naomi Gal
14:50 Anincheckpoint
Customs at a checkpoint(?)
Soldiers are already busy opening the checkpoint on time (13:00). About two dozens people and half a dozen tractors are waiting to enter the barrier and go home to their village of Anin.
One tractor driver is not allowed to carry across two used plastic chairs, and has to leave them outside the checkpoint, next to the shed. This is merely the preview. Another tractor driver arrives, there are a few chairs (used ones as well) in his tractor’s trailer, an old stove and some old curtains androds. The soldiers immediately forbid him to cross over with the chairs and stove and he has to abandon them in the shed. He tries passing the curtains, but those, too, are forbidden. He returns to the shed to leave the curtains.
We asked the commander, a second lieutenant, what's wrong with taking chairs and used curtains to `Anin. The answer: they are not agricultural goods: it’s not olives, not olive oil nor almonds. Transferring merchandise that’s not agriculture requires special coordination at Reihan checkpoint. The officer asked us if we visited lately an airport, and if we were aware that you have to pay duty when transferring goods from one country to another. Here, he stresses, we are moving goods from “blue zone” ("ours", Israeli) to “red zone” ("enemy"). We were puzzled and asked if he was aware of the fact that both the red AND the blue are Palestinian zones, which means moving goods from Palestine to Palestine. No, he said he was not aware. According to him the blue zone is Israel. An officer!
15:45 Shaked-Torra
There is hardly any traffic at this time.
16:10 Riehan-Barta`a, the Palestinian side
The parking lot is crowded. A few taxis are on their way to the West Bank.
16:30 Rihan-Barta`a, the seam zoon side
A new drinking fountain has been installed in the small playground.
Many workers go down the metal sleeve to the terminal. Two windows are active and manage the flow of people and there are no lines on the way home, to the West Bank. There are no delays even when some people pass to the other side.
Someone complains about the difficulties of crossing over in the morning at Irtach checkpoint (entering into Israel) in the center of the west bank. He says that every day he and many others have to go through a second inspection in the inner rooms.
17:05 Getting back to the upper parking lot we met a delegation of German youngsters and their Israeli guide. As part of their tour in Israel and the occupied territories they are visiting this checkpoint and would visit another one in Jerusalem (Qalandia?). They said that in Jerusalem they would meet a representative of Machsom-Watch.
'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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