Barta’a-Reihan, Tayba-Rummana, Tura-Shaked
06:10 Barta’a/Reihan checkpoint
Palestinians come in groups to the Palestinian parking lot from which people from the West Bank proceed to the terminal. They move without delay to the revolving gate but are stopped at the terminal entrance. About 80 people are stuck in the sleeve leading to the terminal. An elderly man complains angrily that it’s been like this recently. He says it takes an hour or more to go through. A young man confirmed what he said. At 06:20 people began moving into the terminal, very slowly. We had to leave in order to reach the other checkpoints.
07:00 Tura/Shaked
People start going through at 07:05. Schools are on winter vacation, and in the absence of pupils and teachers the only ones crossing are a few laborers going from the West Bank to the seam zone.
08:06 Tayibe/Rummaneh
At the checkpoint, operated by the Border Police, are two vehicles – the Border Police jeep and the DCL’s Toyota. We were glad to see that this time the authorities finally arrived on time. Our joy didn’t last longer than five minutes: the two vehicles left, first the jeep, then the Toyota. Of course, the Palestinians waiting on the other side of the closed checkpoint received no explanation. Our attempt to ask a soldier who’d gotten out of the Toyota for a moment what was going on was unsuccessful. We’re being boycotted.
09:20 Seventy minutes later a jeep finally arrived with a number of Border Police soldiers. During the long wait for them we spoke three times by phone with the Salem DCL which promised us each time that the soldiers were on their way and that there are “problems on the route.” Two female and one male soldier came toward our side of the gate to opened the lock and chain. They ignored our `good morning’ and our question of why they arrived so late. They were very focused on the lock and the key and didn’t reply. Then they turned and moved away. One of the female soldiers ran the crossing; we haven’t seen such rude, coarse behavior at the checkpoints in a long time. Even from afar we could hear how she sends people away with the exquisite Arabic employed by soldiers who know only Hebrew: Get out of here, yalla, go home – to a woman with two children. Her body language was equally ugly. The father, who’d brought them in his car, came over to plead with the soldiers: the unforgivable and intolerable sight of a middle-aged man begging and requesting consideration for his daughter and her children, facing indifferent soldiers lording it over him. One of the people going through told us the woman has a permit to go through the Barta’a checkpoint and for some reason wanted to cross here. Nu, that’s really chutzpah on her part and so she must be rudely embarrassed and turned away from the checkpoint. Good for the female Border Police soldier and her colleagues, none of whom bothered to calm her down.
Two tractors and about 25 people went through, including farmers carrying tiny olive seedlings. Angry at the long wait. The soldiers hate us, one said. Jews and Arabs will never live in peace. Never.
We waited for the Border Police soldiers to lock the gate and approached them. The female soldier heard briefly what we thought of her shameful behavior. She grinned. In embarrassment, perhaps?
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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Tayba-Rummana
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Tayba-Rummana is an agricultural checkpoint. It is located in the separation fence in front of the eastern slopes of the Israeli city of Umm al-Fahm. The Palestinian villages next to the checkpoint are Khirbet Tayba and Rummana. Dozens of dunams of olive groves were removed from their owners, the residents of these villages on the western side of the separation fence. The Palestinian villages next to the checkpoint are Khirbet Tayba and Rumna. Dozens of olives dunams were removed from these villages' residents and swallowed up in a narrow strip of space, on the western side of the separation fence. The checkpoint allows the plantation owners who have permits to pass. Twice a week, the checkpoint opens for fifteen minutes in the morning and evening. During the harvest season, it opens every day for fifteen minutes in the morning (around 0630) and fifteen minutes in the afternoon (around 1530). (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)
Ruti TuvalMar-21-2022Anin Checkpoint: A magnificent breach in the center of the checkpoint
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