Northern checkpoints in the shadow of the separation barrier and the terrorist attacks
As happened two weeks ago, once again, we were there a few hours before a shooting attack
05:30 Barta’a- Reihan checkpoint
A huge number of workers are crowding the junction, waiting for their rides to work. The parking lot on the Seamline Zone side is completely full and impossible to get through it. We continue to the parking lot on the Palestinian side. Many workers are going up the sleeve, which is fenced in and covered. There’s still space in the parking lots. There’s dirt all over the place! People are climbing up from the lower parking lot through a steep path inside the garbage dump. Crossing the checkpoint seems to be going ahead without delay.
06:10 Hermesh checkpoint
Around 200 meters in front of the checkpoint the young lad we met at the checkpoint last week is sitting alone on a mattress beside the road. He’s 17, from the Tel-Menashe settlement. Beside him is a row of 4 chairs like you see in the theater. He slept here last night. No, his parents aren’t at all worried. He’s a good kid, finished 11th grade and he’s done all his matriculation exams. He’s not bothered by the fact that he kept five soldiers busy guarding him while he slept. The checkpoint is open for people to cross. Two paratroopers are checking the cars and politely wishing the passengers sabah el-kher [good morning]. Reminder: this checkpoint was not operational for months and is manned now following a fatal terrorist attack.
06:30 Ya’abed-Dotan checkpoint
Apparently, there are no soldiers at all here. Traffic is light and the vehicles are passing through without delay. A few drivers wish us good morning with a smile.
06:55 Tura-Shaked checkpoint
The soldiers/policemen are already here, but people and cars are being held up. The first to go through to the Seamline Zone arrives at 7:12. A driver who advanced a little towards the checkpoint gets shouted at by a female soldier standing behind a concrete block with her weapon drawn. “Go back, back up, back up.” He backs up. His wife is sitting in the back of the car with a small child. She’s a young teacher on her way to an exam in Jenin. The soldiers finally let them through, apparently thanks to our intervention. Three Border Policemen come towards us to move us away from the gate “because it’s a security checkpoint” (?) and mutter something about some incident in the area. A driver who works in the mattress factory in the Shahak industrial park is waiting for three seamstresses who are late this morning. He explains to us that the owner doesn’t care if they’re late “we pay for the time.”
07:30 Anin checkpoint
The new gate has already been installed inside the wall. The soldiers tell us that tractors crossed yesterday even though the electricity hasn’t been connected yet. Trucks are unloading concrete blocks and a crane is working in the distance. At noon we heard on the radio that there had been a shooting attack in the area. We learnt that the T-junction at Amricha is a zero junction for some reason.
We talk to A., a dear informant from Ya’abed. The village is closed (it’s said that the attackers came from there). There’s no coming or going. He tells us that the Barta’a checkpoint has been closed as well – now, when at last he has a good job in Israel.
'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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Hermesh
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Hermesh
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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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