‘Azzun, Eliyahu Crossing, Falamiya, Habla, Jayyus, Kufr Jammal, Mon 9.1.12, Morning
Report on the schoolchildren 85 children from the Bedouin village of Arab a-Ramadin which is located in the seam zone next to Checkpoint 109 on the hills near Highway 55, travel each day in two buses to school in Habla. In the morning they must go through the Habla agricultural gate to enter Palestine, and return that way in the afternoon. The children are aged 7-18. The same drivers work every day; their documents are usually inspected quickly and the children don’t have to get off the bus. Sometimes the soldiers enter the bus with drawn weapons to inspect (something – I don’t know what…). They also check around the bus.
There were times in the past when children who looked older were taken off the bus and asked for documents, and were even sent back home, far away, without any means of transportation.. Today, say the drivers, there aren’t any problems.
Another group of 35 children attends school in the village of Nabi Elias.
06:45 Habla
Soldiers sit waiting in a military vehicle. Many Palestinians wait to cross.
06:50 The soldiers get out and begin getting ready to open the checkpoint. The checkpoint commander explains that they try to open early so there won’t be congestion. And in fact the first five enter the inspection building at 06:56 and exit at 07:00. The next group enters at 07:00 and exits at 07:04. People continue to go through at the same rate during the entire time we were there.
The Palestinians exiting stop at an announcement posted on the gate, which states:
As of 10.1 (that is, tomorrow)the checkpoint will open at 07:15,which will make it harder for everyone. The soldiers don’t know the reason for the change and understand the difficulties it will cause the Palestinians. The other opening and closing times haven’t changed.
07:10 The school bus arrives, waits for the second bus and then both drivers get out and wait together to enter the inspection room. The soldiers are new here; they ask who the children are and where they’re going.
07:20 The buses cross.
07:25 We leave after the elderly guard from the plant nurseries arrives and crosses quickly.
07:35 Checkpoint 109
We go into the parking lot and talk with the waiting taxi drivers. They complain about the inspections they have to undergo each time they cross the checkpoint, sometimes ten times a day. They request that dogs not enter the vehicles, and not slobber on the seats and in the glove compartment. Dogs aren’t used on Saturday; inspection is carried out with the magnemometer, so if that’s ok why aren’t their requests taken into consideration?!
Cars are inspected quickly in the vehicle area. No line of pedestrians crossing at this hour.
08:10 We leave.
We drive to Jayyus via 'Azzun 'Atma. We see the pruned and plowed olive groves along the way, ready for the coming season. We missed the turn to the Falamya agricultural crossing (the blue post we used as a landmark had been removed…) and reached Kafr Jimal via the highway. The schoolchildren have exams so regular classes aren’t being held; the children fill the streets. But since we wanted to see what was happening at the Falamya agricultural crossing, we drove back. We saw no one going through, except for a tractor that crossed and continued north for a long distance on the security road.
We drove through the village of Falamya (where there were also many children in the streets) and then back to Kafr Jimal to see whether the permits that had been taken from them a few weeks ago had been returned.
09:50 The Kafr Jimal grocery
It turns out that farmers aren’t allowed to enter and cultivate their olive groves, as we saw in the Jayyus area. לא ברור לי – באזור ג'איוס כן נתנו לחקלאים לעבד את החלקות, או לא נתנו להם? They’re allowed to go through the Falamya checkpoint to the za’atar fields and avocado groves but can’t get to the more distant olive groves that are closed off behind concertina wire, even though they were promised access. Moreover, a Palestinian whose name and address I have, his wife and his brother, whose permits to cross via the Falamya gate were confiscated as punishment, haven’t gotten them back. They’re farmers; that’s their only income, they’re no longer young and no one in the family is able to get to their lands.
We met the children of our friend, the owner of the grocery, who’d gone to the beach during the summer and whose eyes sparkled recalling the wonderful experience.
On our way home we saw the first anemones and almond blossoms.
'Azzun
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Azoun (updated February 2019)
A Palestinian town situated in Area B (under civil Palestinian control and Israeli security control),
on road 5 between Nablus and Qalqiliya, east of Nabi Elias village. The inhabitants are allowed to construct and improve infrastructures. The Separation Fence has confiscated lands belonging to the town's people. In 2018 olive tree groves owned by one of its inhabitants were confiscated for the sake of paving a road to bypass Nabi Elias. Azoun population numbers 13,000, its economic state dire. Its infrastructures are poor, neglect and poverty rampant. In the meantime, the town council has completed paving an internal road for the inhabitants' welfare.
Because of its proximity to the Jewish settler-colony of Karnei Shomron and its outposts, the town suffers the intense presence of the Israeli army, especially at nighttime: soldiers enter homes, arrest suspects, trash the house and sometimes ruin it, as they do in numerous places in the West Bank. At times a checkpoint closes the entrance to the town, so no one can come in or get out.
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Eliyahu CP (109) / Crossing
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Eliyahu CP (109) / Crossing This checkpoint, also known as the Fruit Crossing, is one of the main checkpoints between Israel and the West Bank. It is located on Route 55 between Alfei Menashe and the turn to Qalqilya and Zufin, more than 4 km east of the Green Line, in the separation fence, which separates Qalqilya from its lands to the south, thus leaving Alfei Menashe West of the fence - the Seam Zone. This checkpoint, a few kilometers across the Green Line, is intended for "Israeli settlement in the West Bank and the population of the Seam Zone." It is managed by a civil company. Palestinians with a special permit for their lands in the seam area are also allowed to pass through it, on foot, and sometimes by car.
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Falamiya
See all reports for this placeHabla
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Habla CP (1393)
The Habla checkpoint (1393) was established on the lands of the residents of Qalqilya, on the short road that
connected it for centuries to the nearby town of Habla. The separation barrier intersects this road twice and cut off the residents of Qalqilya from their lands in the seam zone.(between the fence and the green line).
There is a passage under Road 55 that connects Qalqilya to the sabotage This agricultural barrier is used by the farmers and nursery owners established along Road 55 from the Green Line and on both sides of the kurkar road leading to the checkpoint.
This agricultural checkpoint serves the residents of Arab a-Ramadin al-Janoubi (detached from the West Bank), who pass through it to the West Bank and back to their homes. The opening hours (3 times a day) of this agricultural checkpoint are longer than usual, about an hour (recently shortened to 45 minutes), and are coordinated with the transportation hours of a-Ramadin children studying in the occupied in the West Bank.
Nina SebaAug-18-2025Habla: The gate is in the process of closing
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Jayyus North (935)
See all reports for this placeKufr Jammal
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Kufr Jammal This village, rising about 200 meters over sea level, is located about 14 kilometers south of Tul Karm town and about 17 kilometers from the Mediterranean Sea. The families living there since the mid-18th century number about 3,000 persons at present. The village has lost thousands of dunams of its northern and western lands due to the construction of the Separation Barrier, leaving the lands themselves behind the barrier. After the Israeli Supreme Court ruling in 2011, the barrier was moved to the west and many farmlands were returned to their owners. It is a quiet village, its relations with the nearby settler-colony of Sal’it are favorable, and many of the villagers work in the colony’s industrial plants. Farmers cross the agricultural checkpoint close to this settler-colony in order to tend their fields unhampered. However, there are numerous acts of harassment and disorder taking place when the village farmers cross the other agricultural checkpoints: gates do not open at hours suitable to the farmers’ needs, and for a short period of time only; the Civil Administration usually prevents all kinds of crops except olives; tractors and other farm equipment are forbidden entry; only a single permit is issued per family, and occasionally such permits are confiscated and their re-issue is delayed – the common excuse is usually “security reasons”. How do the villagers make their living? Holders of work permits inside Israel travel at 3 a.m. to Eyal Checkpoint near Qalqiliya town in order to make it on time to their workplace at Sal’it (close to their village) and elsewhere. Owners of vegetable patches who hold permits are allowed to reach their fields beyond the Separation Barrier through the distant Falamiya Checkpoint. Importantly, fields returned to the village show amazing improvement intending, irrigation and farming variety – and instead of the neglected olive tree groves that were accessible only to holders of transit permits through agricultural checkpoints usually closed, farming has now flourished. (updated Jan 2021)
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