Aanin checkpoint is locked and sealed

Place:

Barta'a-Reihan

Tura-Shaked

Tags:

Delay in opening the checkpoint

Observers:

Tami Ritov (photographer), Hanna Heller and Aman (guest journalist from India) Translation: Naomi Halsted

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Sep-7-2023

Afternoon

The wall in Anin is closed. There is no exit and no return.

Photo:

Tami Ritov

A fish seller at the Barta`a checkpoint

Photo:

Tami Ritov

15:00–17:00

Barta’a checkpoint in the seamline zone: We drove via the town of Barta’a, which is divided by the small wadi running through it into Israel on one side (where the residents are Israeli citizens) and the Palestinian area in the seamline zone, where the residents don't have rights, on the other side.

At the checkpoint at this time, hundreds of workers are returning to their homes in the West Bank from work in Israel and the seamline zone. One of them told us that when the checkpoint first opens in the morning between 4 and 5, there is very heavy congestion in the hut. Recently, people have been crushed together and gotten injured in a hole that's appeared in the side of the hut. He's reported it several times to people working at the checkpoint but it hasn't been fixed and he asks us for our help. We'll do what we can.

Workers who go through later (around 6 a.m.) say they get through quickly and there's no congestion.

Waiters who work at weddings are coming up the long sleeve info-icon from the West Bank to the seamline zone and Israel, as are students coming home for the weekend. A resident of Israeli Barta’a is returning from a family visit in the West Bank and complains that he can't drive his car through this checkpoint. At the entrance to the checkpoint a fish merchant from Haifa is selling fish from the distant sea that everyone yearns for.

Tura checkpoint – used by Palestinians and residents of the seamline zone to cross between these two areas.

Palestinian cars are waiting to cross into the West Bank from the seamline zone. The line is moving slowly. Several workers are returning to the West Bank mainly from work in the seamline zone. They tell us that yesterday evening (around 8 p.m.) 15 cars left Tura with passengers on their way to an event in Umm Reihan in the seamline zone. Five of the cars were inspected slowly and allowed through and the checkpoint was then closed. The remaining 10 cars were forced to go a very long way round via Ya’bed-Dotan checkpoint (where they were stopped again) to Barta’a checkpoint and continue from there to Umm Reihan.

We drive to Anin agricultural checkpoint, which is now closed, to show it to our guest. We’re surprised to see that three soldiers are still posted there 24/7 and construction of the monstrous wall is continuing. The gate that’s supposed to open only twice a year has been upgraded and given new features (see picture).

Location Description

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).