'Anin, Barta'a-Reihan, Tura-Shaked, Ya'bed-Dotan

Place:

Barta'a-Reihan

Tura-Shaked

'Anin

Ya'bed-Dotan

Observers:

Idit B., Shiri (New Member), Neta Golan (Reporting Translation: Bracha Ben-Avraham

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Apr-30-2015

Morning

06:30 – A'anin Checkpoint

A vehicle from the Liaison and Coordination Administration is already at the checkpoint. The army vehicle that is bringing the keys to the gates info-icon is late. An officer and two women cadets get out of the Liaison and Coordination Administration vehicle. About two dozen people and two tractors cross to the seamline zone.

06:50 – The checkpoint closes ten minutes before it is due to close. A soldier reports that an officer from the Liaison and Coordination Administration has given permission to close the checkpoint early. The officer consents, saying that everyone has crossed anyway. There is a security incident along the separation fence and the soldiers must go to see what is going on. They will return later to see if anyone is there who wants to cross. We have no way of knowing if they really returned or not.

This week a person was shot and killed near Tura – Shaked Checkpoint.

Tura – Shaked Checkpoint, 07:00

The soldiers lazily open the checkpoint. The first person crosses to the seamline zone at 07:15. A cute lamb crosses as it is held by its owner. People are waiting to cross on the Palestinian side of the checkpoint. There are no school children today. Tomorrow is May Day, the workers' holiday, and schools are on holiday today as well. One of the teachers who lives in the West Bank and teachers in the school at Um Al-Reihan in the seamline zone is crossing today despite the holiday. Before he became a teacher he worked in the carpet factory in the Shahak Industrial Zone. He still works there part-time on holidays and weekends to ensure his future pension.

Yesterday, Wednesday April 29^th a small article appeared in the Israeli Newspaper HaAretz on page six stating that a Palestinian had been shot and killed by the IDF. The article stated that the young man, who was 18 years old, was shot near the settlement of Shaked and died of his injuries at the hospital in Nablus. According to the army stones were thrown at soldiers. The checkpoint is now quiet. It is hard to imagine that a young man was recently killed here. One person tells us that someone "died" at the checkpoint two days ago. He then said that he was shot because he was taking pictures of the fence. Afterwards someone to whom we gave a ride told us that the young man was with his parents next to the fence tending olive trees with his parents.

At 08:00 we drove past Reihan – Barta'a Checkpoint. A lot of tenders are waiting next to the vehicle inspection point. Both sides of the bridge are blocked as usual: one by an iron gate and the other by concrete barriers. The gate leading to Emricha is also locked and an army jeep is parked beside it.

08:10 – Yaabed – Dotan Checkpoint – The checkpoint is not manned. Traffic is moving freely in both directions.

08:20 – Reihan – Barta'a Checkpoint, Palestinian Side

Both the regular and the auxiliary parking lot are full and there are a lot of cars parked along the road. The gate to the terminal is closed. About a dozen people are waiting. After a short time the gate opens and people say it is because we are there. People continue to arrive and enter immediately. There is a sign in Arabic with pictures of various items that can be brought through only after 10:00 AM. These include tools and other items that are liable to delay the inspections during rush hour. One of the drivers explains that sometimes people are allowed to bring in these tools only after 12:00. We were also told that people were arrested for throwing stones. We assume that the army jeep parked near Yaabed has to do with this.

09:00 – We left. We cannot stop thinking about the young 19-year-old man who was shot and killed near Tura-Shaked Checkpoint.

Location Description

Anin agricultural checkpoint

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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, for periods of time that are growing shorter Lith time. It is meant for Anin farmers whose olive groves have been separated from the village by the fence. 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. At times 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 every day 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 according to which 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 info-icon ), and the fence around it has been broken in several sites.

Tura-Shaked Checkpoint

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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-22-2022

Ruti Tuval

The locked gate at the Anin checkpoint

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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).

Ya’abad-Dotan

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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)