‘Azzun, Irtah (Sha’ar Efrayim)
Irtach-Maaleh Ephraim – 05:00
The new parking lot is completely filled with cars. The new facilities are in operation. Many workers have already crossed the checkpoint and are standing in groups. Some are lying on the ground under the new shed, trying to catch up on sleep, and others are talking and drinking their morning coffee.
We went to observe the new facilities with mixed feelings. On one hand, the overcrowding and dangerous congestion that was an inseparable part of the old facilities is gone. People line up in steel corridors, and the line moves forward at a rate of about 60 people per minute. However, the new efficiency, the electric fences which surround the place and the technological solutions for people are difficult to contain. The occupation runs more efficiently.We were almost happy to see the cats crawling under the fences, disregarding the checkpoints.
All the workers spoke to us us apathetically: "It's better,” regarding the new arrangements. One said that it took him about 40 minutes, from the time he had arrived at the checkpoint, to reach the other side. Another asked for our help in obtaining a permit for a friend. We left at 06:00.
We drove through the sleeping villages of Safrin and Beit Leed. A young man stopped his car next to us and suggested that we drive along the main road, claiming that it was safer. When we assured him that we were used to driving through the villages he said that the people were OK, but that he thought that we had lost our way.
There were three soldiers standing at the entrance to Azun. One was busy with his morning prayers. They were surprised to see us enter the village but didn't say anything.
'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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Irtah (Sha'ar Efrayim)
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The checkpoint is for Palestinians only. It is the main barrier to the passage of workers from the northern West Bank to Israel. Workers with a permit to work in Israel and also for trade (with appropriate permissions), medicine, and visiting prisoners. One can cross the checkpoint only on foot. The checkpoint is located north of Road 557 and south of Tulkarm. Operated by a civil security company, opening hours: between 4:00 and 19:00 on weekdays. As members of Machsom Watch, we began our shifts to this location in 2007. We arrived before it opened at 4 in the morning and report since, on the harsh conditions and the long and crowded queues of workers. The workers who pass by continue their journey by transportation to work throughout Israel. In the first period of its activity, about 3,000 and then 5,000 people passed through this checkpoint every day. Due to the small number of checking points and arbitrary delays for long periods of time in the "rooms", workers feared losing their transportation. Hence workers leave their homes at 2:30 at night to be among the first. Today, 15,000 pass and the transition is faster. Workers are still leaving their homes very early to get past the checkpoint at 7 p.m. In an adjacent compound, there is a terminal for the transfer of goods on a commercial scale, using the back-to-back method.
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