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Reihan, Shaked, Sat 2.2.08, Morning

Observers: Sarit A., Rachel C. (reporting)
Feb-02-2008
| Morning

07:00 Reihan Checkpoint
Taxis wait in the upper parking lot to take people to work. We walk down to the checkpoint, but are stopped on the way:  Passage to the lower parking lot is by car only. We are surprised, and ask them to clarify, whereupon permission for our crossing is granted
07:10 – in the lower lot the yellow gate opens. By the pedestrian gate 30-40 people are waiting, and being admitted by fives. Occasionally a sixth person tries to enter and is immediately sent back with a rebuke. People are coming (from the West Bank) by taxi or on foot, including the seamstresses (elegant and pleasant as always). We buy tea and halva. Walid doesn’t look good (though he says that everything is okay). Under the roofing a pallette with sacks of sugar (one kilo packages) and another product that we can't identify.
07:30 – all the waiting people have entered the terminal. We go to meet them cas they come out. At the vehicle checkpoint, cars are being inspected in threes. The dogs are barking.
07:40 – they start to come out in the direction of the Seam Zone. The seamstresses emerge at 08:00, some 40 minutes after they have arrived. Somebody says that the rooms are not working fast: "We’ve been inside since you were drinking tea at the entrance. One of my brothrs still hasn’t come out. It is like this all day – and what are you doing about it?" The young man we are waiting for emerges only at 08:25, an hour after entering.


08:50 Shaked Checkpoint

Only one wing of the gate is open. Thin traffic. Whoever comes – passes. One person (from Tura) says that on Friday permits were confiscated from people who had not returned the previous evening.
The soldier in the post shouts to us. Among the words we catch: "What are you looking at?"
09:00 – we leave.
  • 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).

  • 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)
      מחסום עאנין:  פרצה מפוארת במרכז המחסום
      Mar-21-2022
      Anin Checkpoint: A magnificent breach in the center of the checkpoint
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