‘Awarta, Beit Furik, Huwwara, Za’tara (Tapuah), יום ה’ 12.3.09, בוקר
Translation: Suzanne O.
At Awarta, at the exit from Nablus, there is a queue of tens of cars and it takes an hour and a half to two hours to cross.
6:25 a.m.
At Sha'ar Shomron there is a police roadblock.
The entrance to Marda is open and at Zeita closed as usual.
Za'atra
6:45 a.m.
There is no queue at the crossing.
During the time we were there between 4 and 10 were in the queue from the direction of Nablus and they cross almost without inspection. One lane is open. A bus is in the car park and, before documents are returned, the passengers are taken off. One of them who remember Nava from a previous meeting calls us over and claims that it is discrimination to hold up bus passengers while the other cars cross without any hindrance. It is certainly another way of looking at this harassment…
A car is parked at the side, waiting. The roadblock commander says he "spoke rudely" and "laughed at the soldiers". The punishment is education by waiting… he is released after about 10 minutes.
Beit Furiq
7:15 a.m.
Cars cross without inspection. There are new speed humps at the exit from Nablus.
Awarta
7:30 a.m.
There is a queue of tens of cars at the exit from Nablus.
The drivers tell us that it takes about half an hour for cars to cross and two hours for lorries.
We telephoned the humanitarian centre and the Nablus DCO and asked them to intervene. We drove to Huwwara to find the DCO representative.
Huwwara
7:50 a.m.
Two car lanes are open and there are 15 cars in the queue.
There is no queue of pedestrians and very few enter Nablus.
The Palestinians tell us that there is a detainee at the concrete blocks whom we are unable to see.
He spent 10 months in an Israeli prison and was released 6 months ago. The commander says that he is being checked and we, of course, are unable to communicate with him.
The DCO representative, A., says that he was told, via the Op. Room, that there is no queue at Awarta. We try to persuade him to come with us to see but he must not leave Huwwara he is not prepared to give us his telephone number so that we can contact him from there.
Back at Awarta
8:35 a.m
The commander is very hostile and says that the queue is normal and he is carrying out the necessary inspections – checking the drivers against the 'bingo' list. It turns out that he is the one who reported that everything is OK and there are no problems.
We went along the whole queue and counted 44 cars. Once again we phoned the DCO and asked for the commander. He is not available, he will call us back.
The only assistance we were able to give was to advise an elderly sick man in a car, on his way to Ramallah, to move into the empty VIP queue and we asked the commander to let him through quickly.
Back to Huwwara
9:00 a.m.
The DCO representative says that his commander will not let him leave Huwwara to go and find out what is really happening at Awarta. It appears that S., the DCO officer in charge of Awarta, is ill. We did see him last week running the crossing extremely well and not allowing the soldiers to make too many hold ups.
This is the reason that people have to wait two hours to cross!!! In addition the commander reports to his superiors that everything is fine!!
9:15 a.m.
Finally Abu Rokon from the DCO got back to us. We were already on our way back. We asked him to send a representative to Awarta urgently.
9:30 a.m.
There is no queue at Za'atra.
'Awarta
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Awarta, an internal checkpoint in the heart of the West Bank, is located east of the Hawara checkpoint, at the junction of Roads 555 (which was forbidden for Palestinian traffic in this area) and the entrance road to Nablus. It was one of the four checkpoints that surrounded Nablus until 2009. We used to watch it at Huwwara shifts because it was the only one where goods could be transferred to and from Nablus, using the back-to-back method. It was operated by the army, from 06:00 to 20:00. Until 2009.
Ronit Dahan-RamatiJan-6-2026Awarta: Traffic jam on the way to Nablus
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Beit Furik checkpoint
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One of the three internal checkpoints that closed on the city of Nablus - Beit Furik to the east, Hawara to the south, Beit Iba to the west. The checkpoint is located at the junction of Roads 557 (an apartheid road that was forbidden for Palestinians), leading to the Itamar and Alon Morea settlements and Road 5487. The checkpoint was established in 2001 for pedestrians and vehicles; The opening hours were short and the transition was slow and very problematic.Allegedly, the checkpoint is intended to monitor the movement to and from Nablus of the residents of Beit Furik and Beit Dajan, being the only opening outside their villages. Since May 2009 the checkpoint is open 24 hours a day, the military presence is limited, vehicles can pass through it without inspections, except for random inspections. (Updated April 2010)
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Huwwara
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The Huwwara checkpoint is an internal checkpoint south of the city of Nablus, at the intersection of Roads 60 and 5077 (between the settlements of Bracha and Itamar). This checkpoint was one of the four permanent checkpoints that closed on Nablus (Beit Furik and Awarta checkpoints to the east and the Beit Iba checkpoint to the west). It was a pedestrian-only barrier. As MachsomWatch volunteers, we watched therre since 2001 two shifts a day - morning and noon, the thousands of Palestinians leaving Nablus and waiting for hours in queues to reach anywhere else in the West Bank, from the other side of the checkpoint the destination could only be reached by public transport. In early June 2009, as part of the easing of Palestinian traffic in the West Bank, the checkpoint was opened to vehicular traffic. The passage was free, with occasional military presence in the guard tower. Also, there were vehicle inspections from time to time. Since the massacre on 7.10.2023, the checkpoint has been closed to Palestinians.
On February 26, 2023, about 400 settlers attacked the town's residents for 5 hours and set fire to property, such as houses and cars. Disturbances occurred in response to a shooting of two Jewish residents of Har Bracha by a Palestinian Terrorist. The soldiers stationed in the town did not prevent the arson and rescued Palestinian families from their homes only after they were set on fire. No one was punished and Finance Minister Smotrich stated that "the State of Israel should wipe out Hawara." Left and center organizations organized solidarity demonstrations and support actions for the residents of Hawara.Hawara continued to be in the headlines in all the months that followed: more pogroms by the settlers, attacks by Palestinians and a massive presence of the army in the town. It amounted to a de facto curfew of commerce and life in the center of the city. On October 5, 2023, MK Zvi established a Sukkah in the center of Hawara and hundreds of settlers backed the army blocked the main road and held prayers in the heart of the town all night and the next day. On Saturday, October 7, 23 The "Swords of Iron" war began with an attack by Hamas on settlements surrounding Gaza in the face of a poor presence of the IDF. Much criticism has been made of the withdrawal of military forces from the area surrounding Gaza and their placement in the West Bank, and in the Hawara and Samaria region in particular, as a shield for the settlers who were taking over and rioting.
On November 12, 2023, the first section of the Hawara bypass road intended for Israeli traffic only was opened. In this way, the settlers can bypass the road that goes through the center of Hawara, which is the main artery for traffic from the Nablus area to Ramallah and the south of the West Bank. For the construction of the road, the Civil Administration expropriated 406 dunams of private land belonging to Palestinians from the nearby villages. The settlers are not satisfied with this at the moment, and demand to also travel through Hawara itself in order to demonstrate presence and control.(updated November 2023)
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Shoshi AnbarMay-18-2025Huwara: The old houses in Area C
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Za'tara (Tapuah)
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Za'tara (Tapuah) Za'tara is an internal checkpoint in the heart of the West Bank, at the intersection of Road 60 and Road 505 (Trans-Samaria), east of the Tapuah settlement. This checkpoint is the "border" marked by the IDF between the north and south of the West Bank, in accordance with the policy of separation between the two parts of the West Bank that has been in place since December 2005. At the Za'tara checkpoint, there are separate routes for Israelis and Palestinians. In the route for Israelis, there are no inspections and the route for Palestinians inspects. The queue lengthens and shortens suits. The checkpoint is open 24 hours a day. The checkpoint is partially staffed and the people who pass through it are checked at random.
Shoshi AnbarSep-27-2023Za'atra (Tapuah Intersection). Signs
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