The northern checkpoints: starve or pass
Work = money = food = life
I called my friends who live in the occupied territories to wish them Ramadan kareem and ask how they are. They were glad and thrilled to know that we care, that we miss them. With all the difficulty of the present situation and perhaps because of it, we are helped by black humor and cynical comments about their folk and ours.
Who said there is no partner on the “other” side?
Here is some of what I heard:
A.: The economic situation is most difficult, you know. But if you have a job in Israel, will you sit at home and wait for a year or two until the checkpoints are opened? So you cross illegally. The main thing is to work. People are no longer frightened. We are tired of being scared. If we don’t work, we’ll starve. On the other side are Jewish contractors who will do everything to get Palestinian workers. Without these workers, they too will starve…
H.: How do cross? You can. Several days ago, in the middle of the night, soldiers came to the Tayibe-Roumana Checkpoint, an agricultural checkpoint opposite Umm Al Fahm (Israel) closed even before October 7th. They opened the gate and left for a few hours. Somehow people found about it. Perhaps the Palestinian DCO notified people. By word of mouth. Many came and crossed. They walked to Umm Al Fahm (10 minutes) and in the morning Israeli contractors picked them up.
For whom was it worthwhile, opening the checkpoint in the middle of the night?
Ladders and ropes
A’: The game is on ever since the checkpoints closed down even before the war in Gaza. In the wee hours of the night, people from the West Bank climb up the ladder over the high Separation Wall and slide down the rope on its other side. Transports take up from there. Every worker pays twice – 100-150 shekel to whoever supplies a ladder and a rope, and the same sum for whoever drives them further on.
This game takes place in spite of the army’s patrols along the wall.
Who profits from the occupation? (We have been reporting this for years)
- Contractors of workers from the West Bank, Jewish drivers, construction and farming contractors from Israel, etc. Everyone works in transporting manpower from the West Bank into Israel.
- Whoever is placed in senior positions in the privatized (non-army) checkpoints, and the army personnel present there. These are usually the entry points into Israel. They have the authority to pass through uninspected trucks with goods (cigarettes, construction materials, food) from the West Bank into Israel (several times a day) and back.
The money changing hands there from Palestinians to Israelis amounts to thousands, even tens of thousands of shekels.
- The State of Israel profits from this situation, interested in weakening the occupied population by backing up and encouraging the chaos among West Bank inhabitants. The Ministry of Defense, Civil Administration and army know exactly where the illegals cross and how. Indifference and deep, complicated corruption are involved, and there is no power that would or could solve them.
As for Ramadan 2024 –
Permitted to pray at Al Aqsa Mosque are men over 60, women over 50, and children up to the age of 14. There are special transports, and their price depends on the distance from Jerusalem. The range is 60-100 shekels per person.
'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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Tayba-Rummana
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Tayba-Rummana is an agricultural checkpoint. It is located in the separation fence in front of the eastern slopes of the Israeli city of Umm al-Fahm. The Palestinian villages next to the checkpoint are Khirbet Tayba and Rummana. Dozens of dunams of olive groves were removed from their owners, the residents of these villages on the western side of the separation fence. The Palestinian villages next to the checkpoint are Khirbet Tayba and Rumna. Dozens of olives dunams were removed from these villages' residents and swallowed up in a narrow strip of space, on the western side of the separation fence. The checkpoint allows the plantation owners who have permits to pass. Twice a week, the checkpoint opens for fifteen minutes in the morning and evening. During the harvest season, it opens every day for fifteen minutes in the morning (around 0630) and fifteen minutes in the afternoon (around 1530). (February 2020).
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