Beit Iba
Beit Iba, Thursday, 9.6.05, AMObservers: Ada H (reporting)Guests: Karin L (France), Erna D7.30 – a line of 14 cars at the checkpoint in the Nablus direction. Three soldiers checking. Drivers of buses are asked to get down. A soldier enters the bus and passes among the passengers, checking IDs and parcels. A second soldier observes him and the passengers from the driver’s seat and the third stands with aimed weapon outside the bus. A young passenger is taken off and sent on foot to the checkpoint. Trucks go through faster if they are on the “lists.” In all 30 minutes till the 14th car goes through.Checking of pedestrians is superficial. No lines, no detainees. The soldiers are polite. Checks of cars from Nablus to Israel are incredibly slow. From our vantage point we can’t see the end of the line. The time between checks seems very long. The soldiers appear bored and sluggish. Few vendors of drinks or food along the path to the checkpoint. They are hiding on the side. A young man (38) asks us if we can help him obtain a magnetic card. He sees he is blacklisted by the Shabak (GSS) because they once shot him in the foot. We gave him the telephone number of Firas Alami from the Civil Rights Association. 9.20 – at the exit from Beit Iba, immediately after the turnoff to Shavei Shomron – a rolling checkpoint. Five young men are sitting in the field in the blazing sun. They were taken off a taxi. The soldiers say there is a red alert from Jenin, and that they will be released after approval is received from the Shabak (GSS). The taxi driver waits 20 minutes and then gives up and leaves with the other passengers, leaving the detainees behind. We took the telephone number of one of them who speaks Hebrew, and later he confirmed that they were all released after half an hour.
Beit Iba
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A perimeter checkpoint west of the city of Nablus. Operated from 2001 to 2009 as one of the four permanent checkpoints closing on Nablus: Beit Furik and Awarta to the east and Hawara to the south. A pedestrian-only checkpoint, where MachsomWatch volunteers were present daily for several hours in the morning and afternoon to document the thousands of Palestinians waiting for hours in long queues with no shelter in the heat or rain, to leave the district city for anywhere else in the West Bank. From March 2009, as part of the easing of the Palestinian movement in the West Bank, it was abolished, without a trace, and without any adverse change in the security situation.
Jun-4-2014Beit-Iba checkpoint 22.04.04
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