Huwwara, Sun 7.12.08, Afternoon
Translation: Tal H.
15:15 In honor of the holiday, leniency reported in the procedures. But let's not overdo it. Here are the details:
DCO representative – Tomer, Commander – X, X-ray truck in action, and as usual, from 4:30 PM on, the anti-bomb sniffer-doggie.
2 active ID checking posts for the young men's lines – active as usual, complete with metal detectors, shoe removal, belts, the works. Less people passing through than usual, probably because no students on eve of holiday.
2 detainees in the hold, one brought hither by soldiers for trying to travel through Palestinians fields and not in the orderly checkpointed manner, to the merry sounds of Rapper Simcha (Joy), the entertaining MPwoman (more below).
The special line for women and the elderly mostly coming through without checks, but for the preservation of arbitrariness, sometimes there are checks. But mostly not.
Vehicles: exiting from Nablus, cars are inspected as usual.
Entering Nablus, they are not. However! Habit makes drivers slow down and stop where the soldiers usually check their papers. Then they scratch their head in bewilderment, wondering where have all the soldiers gone, and trying to figure out what they're supposed to understand from this sudden bliss. The soldiers are always saying "they (the Palestinians) know". But here suddenly "they" don't know. So what do valorous soldiers do? Stand aside, a bit further off, and crack up for sheer laughter at the Palestinians who don't know a thing, do they? Now isn't this fun?
17:00 So here's the real fun: five minutes no Palestinians are being checked at the ID posts, because the soldiers have apparently tired of the routine, so a few of them including one MPwoman play stay through-back off time and again through the metal detector, activating it loudly and incessantly with the metal of their gun barrels, next to brave Simcha (Joy) the MPwoman in order to make her screech the way she does so well. It works: she produces a wild rap routine busy with… us, stupid Machsomwatchers and how they stand and write down everything we say and do to the poor Palestinians oh yeah oh yeah etc. ad infinitum.
Since the victims of this entertainment as usual are the Palestinians who have not been enlightened as to what all this is about, they only know they have been delayed again, and are laughed to their faces, how hilarious while their IDs are not really even looked at while they are taken and handed back but they had to wait there like sheep for so long until let through – we called the army hotline simply to report this new brand of harassment. At least let there be a record.
17:25 – we folded up and took our shame home to roost.
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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