Huwwara north & south
Huwwara Sunday 30.1.05 PMObservers: Noa P., Drora S., Susan L. (reporting)Summary: In spite of all the changes we hear and read about, none of us inMachsomWatch are surprised that it’s more of the same in the WestBank. The four lane highway to Ariel is spotlessly clean, the widest,well lit highway anywhere, and it’s continuing to be built beyondAriel, gouging its way through kilometers of olive groves; a newsettlement with paler than usual red roofs and caravans, dots thelovely terraced landscape as one drives east with a brand new roadcarved into the hillside leading up to it; a recently built industrialarea adds to the economy that’s already there, and the only checkpointuntil Tapuach is a makeshift one where the green line once was. TheNablus checkpoints are only made more bearable when there’s a decenthuman being in charge. 13:45 A group of settler youths at Tapuach, a line of cars, trucks andbuses on the other side of the junction. Signs, in red and white, forthe demonstration in Jerusalem “grace” the various concrete bouldersboth here and at Huwwara.The road to Beita, recently under curfew, is open, people walkingtowards the village with its gold topped mosque. 13:55 Huwwara South:There are six detainees, five are let go shortly after our arrival.D., the soldier in charge, goes to the remaining one, shakes his handand begins to talk with him. It’s not busy, the women military policeand male soldiers all relaxed.14:30-15:15 Huwwara North:A couple of settler youths, women and men, converse with soldiers; theemblazoned Chevrolet truck, with its loudly humming generator, throughwhich packages, luggage and parcels pass, is straddled across thepathway leading from the checkpoint, and it’s busy out of Nablus. Oneof the computers stops working, and O., the multilingualrepresentative of the DCO’s office, helps the soldiers out withchecking IDs. O. (yes, another “O.”) is the soldier in charge, one ofthe most easygoing and cheerful, humane we’ve met. He problem-solvesan issue with a group of women, one of whom is a teacher, the othertwo under 18 years old and without proper identification. A call totheir homes unravels the sticky situation. A distinguished lookingman, Jordanian passport, chats briefly with O., telling us he’s fromthe World Bank, comes this way once a month and comments: “Therearen’t many like him.” We agree and pass on the compliment to O. whobrushes it aside, but is obviously pleased. M., the soldier at the”x-ray” machine, talks of his boredom – here, before that checkpointsin Bethlehem, next, in a couple of weeks, Hebron.
Huwwara
See all reports for this place-
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)
.
Shoshi AnbarMay-18-2025Huwara: The old houses in Area C
-
Jerusalem
See all reports for this place-
The places in East Jerusalem which are visited routinely by MachsomWatch women are Silwan and Sheikh Jarrah. During the month of Ramadan, also the Old City and its environs are monitored.
-