Irtah (Sha’ar Efrayim), Thu 14.5.09, Morning
4.20 The back gate of the checkpoint. The usual sight. A crowd fill the vacuum at the entrance to the checkpoint and wait for it to open.
4.30 The checkpoint opens and closes to group of 30 people each time. The red is switched off and the red is switched off. Quiet. A run to the next gate. Quiet…and so on. We went to the other side.
4.38 The first people come through. And so on.
We waited a long time at the exit area and people thanked us that we came so early in the morning. All of them said one by one that our presence at the checkpoint makes the handling of it better and that when we are there the passage is quicker.
Requests.
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Women asked that there be a separate line for them.
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That the gate should be opened at 4.00 am especially on Sundays when the pressure is greatest because everyone is exiting including those who have permits to sleep in Israel.
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Why is the gate at Barta'a not open in the morning. There are people who come for the north and they are forced to make a big detour so as to get to that point in the morning.
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The checkpoint at Deir Sharaf opens at 5am and the workers from the Nablus area get stuck there and come late to Irtah.
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Why are they not allowed to take water through at the checkpoint.
For some reason the parking area for taxis and employers has been made smaller. Half of the parking lot is now for those who work at the checkpoint and stands empty at any rate at this hour of the day and the area for taxis and employers is full to bursting point. I asked the guard and he said come later and see how full it is. Interesting to know how the workers manage when those leaving are coming in at the end of the day. God has the solutions.
At 6.45 the entry was already empty and the passage was swift.
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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