Awarta, Beit Furik, Huwwara, Za'tara (Tapuah), Mon 2.6.08, Morning

Place:

'Awarta

Beit Furik

Za'tara (Tapuah)

Huwwara

Tags:

Detainees

Crowding

Dogs, dog trainer

Observers:

Rachel & Sophie (guest), Micky F., Moriah F., Snait G (reporting)

Jun-2-2008

Morning

Marda is open, Zeita closed - coming and going.

07:15 Za'tara

No cars waiting from the direction of Tulkarm (reservists manning).

At the main checkpoint (reservists and conscripts) when we arrived, there was a line of 25 vehicles. When we left, 25 minutes later, there were 63 vehicles in line.

Two lanes working plus a "humanitarian" line also serving for passage of cars with Israeli plates. A bus is directed to the parking lot - checking time 11 minutes, other vehicles between one and two minutes.

No active checkpoint at Burin-Yitzhar coming or going.

07:55 Beit Furik

At any given moment while we are there, 8-13 cars.

People pass quickly, cars are checked slowly; one lane serves both directions. Waiting time per vehicle entering Nablus 20-35 minutes. The checkpoint commander is not interested in talking to us.

The tea house is thriving. An additional car seat has been added, and the mint is flourishing.

We saw a truck, with crane, with half-crushed used cars on it. Reason: during the last two days, the Palestinian Authority has begun to confiscate cars that have not received license plates from the Authority.
The same has been done to agricultural machinery. All these cars and work tools are being taken for scrap. Owners have received minuscule compensation, around a quarter of the actual value, which does not allow the purchase of replacement vehicles. These vehicles were, so our sources claim, Israeli vehicles taken off the road in Israel (or stolen),. They, and us, guess that the initiative is in fact that of the "Israeli Authority..."

08:45 Awarta

A dog is being used for some of the checks.

There are four to six vehicles in each direction, being inspected quickly, and when there are more vehicles in any direction, and none in the other, the soldiers immediately open another lane in that direction. We encountered a car with five lawyers who claimed that they waited close to half an hour in Huwwara, and then decided to try their luck at Awarta. Here they were not allowed to pass, because they did not have the appropriate documents, and they had to return to Huwwara.

09:05 Huwwara

One detainee who, when we arrived, had been waiting 45 minutes. He contends that he is detained every day. He appears on a Shabak list, was released 30 minutes after our arrival.

Three lanes functioning plus one for the elderly and women. In the latter, transit is fast. At the gate the passage is usually 1-2 minutes per person, but there is no x-ray machine - it is being repaired - and so people coming out of Nablus with packages are compelled to open them and spread out the contents. This slows the process...

Passage of cars to Nablus is fast, from Nablus slower - 4-7 minutes per vehicle. While we were there, 4-6 were waiting at any given moment, in other words 15-20 minutes wait.

Micky tried to assist an old man who was walking with difficulty by recruiting (for a fee) a taxi to take him the desired distance. The Palestinian driver refused, and so with difficulty she persuaded a UN driver to help.

The checkpoint commander's version:

In conversation with the commander (his initiative), he responded to reservations about whether the youth who was shot two weeks ago did in fact have explosive charges: a. the IDF has stopped blowing up houses of families of those caught in the act. This was to receive confirmation later. b. the boy's body was not removed immediately, because a robot had been summoned to deal with charges, and only after its action and the total removal of explosives was it possible to evacuate the body; that process took, in his estimate, three hours. c. because of the long lines that immediately materialised, since the checkpoint could not be used until the explosives were dealt with, all the waiting people were sent to Awarta.

10:25 Za'tara

Nine or ten vehicles, two lanes, no cars from the direction of Tulkarm.

We did not see detainees info-icon at Shomron Crossing, in either direction. The guests photographed the sign defining, in the faulty language of the Occupation, who is a Palestinian.

Location Description

Checkpoint Beit Furik

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One of the three internal checkpoints that closed on the city of Nablus - Beit Furik to the east, Hawara to the south, Beit Iba to the west.
The checkpoint is located at the junction of Roads 557 (an apartheid road that was forbidden for Palestinians), leading to the Itamar and Alon Morea settlements and Road 5487. The checkpoint was established in 2001 for pedestrians and vehicles; The opening hours were short and the transition was slow and very problematic.

Allegedly, the checkpoint is intended to monitor the movement to and from Nablus of the residents of Beit Furik and Beit Dajan, being the only opening outside their villages.
Since May 2009 the checkpoint is open 24 hours a day, the military presence is limited, vehicles can pass through it without inspections, except for random inspections. (Updated April 2010)

Za'tara (Tapuah) Checkpoint

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Za'atara is an internal checkpoint in the heart of the West Bank, at the intersection of Road 60 and Road 505 (Trans-Samaria), east of the Tapuach settlement.
This checkpoint is the "border" marked by the IDF between the north and south of the West Bank, in accordance with the policy of separation between the two parts of the West Bank that has been in place since December 2005.

At the Za'atara checkpoint, there are separate routes for Israelis and Palestinians. In the route for Israelis, there are no inspections and the route for Palestinians inspects. The queue lengthens and shortens suits.

The checkpoint is open 24 hours a day. The checkpoint is partially staffed and the people who pass through it are checked at random.

Sep-28-2023

Shoshi Anbar

Za'atra (Tapuah Intersection). Signs

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Huwwara - the checkpoint and the township

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The Huwwara checkpoint is an internal checkpoint south of the city of Nablus, at the intersection of Roads 60 and 5077 (between the settlements of Bracha and Itamar). This checkpoint was one of the four permanent checkpoints info-icon that closed on Nablus (Beit Furik and Awarta checkpoints to the east and the Beit Iba checkpoint to the west). It was a pedestrian-only barrier. As MachsomWatch volunteers, we watched therre since 2001 two shifts a day - morning and noon, the thousands of Palestinians leaving Nablus and waiting for hours in queues to reach anywhere else in the West Bank, from the other side of the checkpoint the destination could only be reached by public transport.
In early June 2009, as part of the easing of Palestinian traffic in the West Bank, the checkpoint was opened to vehicular traffic. The passage today is free, but there is still a military presence in the guard tower and vehicle inspections are done from time to time.

On February 26, 2023, about 400 settlers attacked the town's residents for 5 hours and set fire to property, such as houses and cars. Disturbances occurred in response to a shooting of two Jewish residents of Har Bracha by a Palestinian Terrorist. The soldiers stationed in the town did not prevent the arson and rescued Palestinian families from their homes only after they were set on fire. No one was punished and Finance Minister Smotrich stated that "the State of Israel should wipe out Hawara." Left and center organizations organized solidarity demonstrations and support actions for the residents of Hawara.

Hawara continued to be in the headlines in all the months that followed: more pogroms by the settlers, attacks by Palestinians and a massive presence of the army in the town. It amounted to a de facto curfew of commerce and life in the center of the city. On October 5, 2023, MK Zvi established a Sukkah in the center of Hawara and hundreds of settlers backed the army blocked the main road and held prayers in the heart of the town all night and the next day. On Saturday, October 7, 23 The "Swords of Iron" war began with an attack by Hamas on settlements surrounding Gaza in the face of a poor presence of the IDF. Much criticism has been made of the withdrawal of military forces from the area surrounding Gaza and their placement in the West Bank, and in the Hawara and Samaria region in particular, as a shield for the settlers who were taking over and rioting.

On November 12, 2023, the first section of the Hawara bypass road intended for Israeli traffic only was opened. In this way, the settlers can bypass the road that goes through the center of Hawara, which is the main artery for traffic from the Nablus area to Ramallah and the south of the West Bank. For the construction of the road, the Civil Administration info-icon expropriated 406 dunams of private land belonging to Palestinians from the nearby villages. The settlers are not satisfied with this at the moment, and demand to also travel through Hawara itself in order to demonstrate presence and control.

(updated November 2023)

Feb-29-2024

Nina Seba

Huwara checkpoint - the gate is closed

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