Northern Barriers: The hallucinatory aspect of the occupation
Northern Checkpoints
September 1, 2021
The northern part of the West Bank does not provide the dramatic events we witness in the Palestinian Jordan Valley and the South Hebron Hills. Therefore, our eyes here are more open to follow the surreal aspect of things, the absurdities, of the Israeli military occupation. All its parts work separately, working in diverse direction, but their motivation is united. To harm. To cause injustice.
06:00 Return trip on road 611 to the East Barta’a Junction
Looking eastward to road 611, towards the hills and several sleepy Palestinian villages, one sees that are surrounded with activity that seems nearly hectic. Transport vans from Palestine arrive and park below the villages, letting out workers (mostly young ones) who cross the road and the Separation Fence on a light run, in regular close-by holes that await them ‘with open arms’. Most of these people are apparently engaged in the never-ending construction of Harish city and in other sites inside Israel. The Israeli bosses’ vehicles wait for them on the roadside and deliver them to their destinations. Regular movement flows in the early morning hours, not as thick as in the so-so-distant past.
Not only workers seeking livelihood pass through these holes in the fence 24 hours a day. The army, liking to catch or fire at trespassers, sees them, knows about it, and keeps its silence.
06:35 Anin Agricultural Checkpoint
For many months now, numerous people cross this checkpoint (opened twice a week, morning and afternoon), and only one farmer and his son are seen riding a red tractor. We are on friendly terms with this farmer who once in a while calls us to hear how we are, tells us how he is, and mostly greets us warmly. Today another farmer arrived on a tractor. They patiently await the soldiers (who were not late today), to come and open the gate. They have no other options. But until the soldiers did arrive (Military Policemen), three persons quickly crossed through the hole in the fence right next to the checkpoint gate, and disappeared in the nearby olive grove.
07:00 Toura-Shaked checkpoint
The free passage through the whole in the Separation Fence near every single checkpoint stopped the Palestinians’ complaints about the late opening of the checkpoints themselves, about the harassments they undergo, their being turned back home, and the prohibition on passing through certain objects. Such complaints reached our ears long before the holes in the fence appeared. At this checkpoint everything happens slowly, people cross lazily and do not approach us with complaints.
07:10 Hermesh
No checkpoint
07:20 Ya’abad Dotan Checkpoint
Judging by relaxed traffic moving from Jenin to Barta’a and back, we realized that the pillbox was unmanned, as was the road. Better let occupation take its time to run itself and not be run by it.
The weather is ideal. Pastoral occupation… Which is absurd too, in its way.
07:30 Barta’a Checkpoint – lower car park
A young father received Sylvia’s note after laying for us his familiar story: he entered Israel to look for work without the proper documentation, was unfortunately caught as an illegal alien, sent to prison at least twice, and now he is blacklisted from entering Israel again. And is this not absurd with the free crossings through the holes in the fence?
01.09.2021 מחסומי הצפון
נטע גולן ושולי בר (מדווחת ומצלמת)
באזור הצפוני של הגדה המערבית אין התרחשויות כה דרמטיות כמו בבקעה ובדרום הר חברון. לכן כאן העין פנויה יותר לעקוב אחרי ההיבט ההזוי. האבסורדי. שכבר לא מפתיע, של הכיבוש. כל חלקיו עובדים לחוד, פועלים לכיוונים שונים, ורק המוטיבציה מאוחדת. לפגוע. להרע.
0600 הלוך וחזור על כביש 611 לצומת ברטעה המזרחית
במבט מזרחה לכביש 611 לעבר מורדות הגבעות, לעבר מספר כפרים פלסטיניים מנומנמים, רואים שמסביבם רוחשת פעילות כמעט תזזיתית. רכבי הסעה מפלסטין מגיעים וחונים למרגלות הכפרים ומהם נפלטים פועלים (רובם צעירים) שחוצים בריצה קלה את כביש וגדר המערכת בפרצות קבועות סמוכות, הממתינות להם בזרועות פתוחות. רובם ככולם כנראה עובדים בבניית העיר הבלתי נגמרת חריש ובמקומות אחרים בישראל. רכבים של הבוסים הישראלים ממתינים להם בשולי הכביש ומסיעים אותם ליעדם. תנועה קבועה זורמת סביב השעות המוקדמות של הבוקר, לא גדולה כבעבר הלא רחוק.
לא רק פועלים חפצי פרנסה עוברים בפרצות אלה 24 שעות ביממה. הצבא, שאוהב לתפוס או לירות במסיגי גבול, רואה יודע ושותק.
0635 מחסום חקלאי עאנין
כבר חודשים רבים עוברים במחסום (פעמיים בשבוע בוקר ואחה”צ) רק חקלאי אחד ובנו על טרקטור אדום. אנחנו מיודדים עם החקלאי הזה, מדי פעם הוא מצלצל לשמוע מה שלומנו, מספר מה שלומו ובעיקר מברך אותנו בחום. היום הגיע עוד פלאח על טרקטור. הם ממתינים לחיילים בסבלנות (היום לא איחרו), שיבואו ויפתחו. בשבילם אין אופציה אחרת. אך עד שהגיעו החיילים (משטרה צבאית) שלושה אנשים עברו בזריזות בפרצה הצמודה לשער המחסום ונבלעו בכרם הזיתים הסמוך.
0700 מחסום טורה-שקד
המעבר החופשי בפרצות בגדר ההפרדה, מסביב לכל מחסום, עצר את התלונות על איחור בפתיחת המחסום, על התנכלות, על החְזרה הביתה, על איסור להעביר דברים מסוימים. תלונות כאלה שמענו הרבה לפני הופעת הפרצות בגדר. במחסום הזה הכל קורה בהילוך איטי, אנשים עוברים בעצלתיים ולא פונים אלינו בתלונות.
07:10 חרמש אין מחסום
0720 מחסום יעבד דותן
לפי שהתנועה מג’נין לברטעה וחזרה זרמה בנחת, הבנו שאין חיילים בפילבוקס ולא ליד הכביש.
מוטב לתת לכיבוש להתנהל ולא להיות מנוהל.
מזג האוויר מושלם. כיבוש פסטורלי. גם זה קצת הזוי.
0730 מחסום ברטעה חניון תחתון
בחור צעיר אב לילדים קיבל את הפתק של סילביה לאחר ששטח בפנינו את סיפורו הידוע: נכנס לחפש עבודה בישראל ללא ניירת מתאימה, לרוע מזלו נתפס כשב”ח, נשלח לכלא, לפחות פעמיים, עתה הוא מנוע כניסה לישראל. וזה לא הזוי, על רקע המעבר החופשי דרך הפרצות?
'Anin checkpoint (214)
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'Anin checkpoint (214)
'Anin checkpoint is located on the Separation Fence east of the Israeli community Mei Ami and close to the village of Anin in the West Bank. It is opened twice a week, morning and afternoon, on days with shorter light time, for Anin farmers whose olive groves have been separated from the village by the fence it became difficult to cultivate their land. Transit permits are only issued to those who can produce ownership documents for their caged-in land, and sometimes only to the head of the family or his widow, eldest son, and children. Sometimes the inheritors lose their right to tend to the family’s land. The permits are eked out and are re-issued only with difficulty. 55-year-old persons may cross the checkpoint (into Israel) without special permits. During the olive harvest season (about one month around October) the checkpoint is open daily and more transit permits are issued. Names of persons eligible to cross are held in the soldiers’ computers. In July 2007, a sweeping instruction was issued, stating that whoever does not return to the village through this checkpoint in the afternoon will be stripped of his transit permit when he shows up there next time. Since 2019, the checkpoint has not been allways locked with the seam-line zone gate (1 of 3 gates), and the fence around it has been broken in several sites.
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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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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)
Mar-21-2022Anin Checkpoint: A magnificent breach in the center of the checkpoint
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Ya'bed-Dotan
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Ya’bed-Dotan
This checkpoint is located on road 585, at the crossroads of Mevo Dotan settler-colony / Jenin/ Ya’abad. It has an army watchtower (‘pillbox’ post) and concrete blocs that slow down vehicular traffic. It was erected when Barta’a Checkpoint, lying to the west on the Separation Fence, was privatized and its operation was passed over to civilian security personnel. Since December 2009 this checkpoint enables flow of Palestinian vehicular traffic towards the Barta’a Checkpoint. Seldom is it manned by soldiers sitting in the watchtower, who conduct random inspections of vehicles and passengers. (february 2020)
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