A tour of recently opened agricultural checkpoints

We left with Mustafa to the agricultural checkpoints between Qalqiliya and Tulkarm which had been closed at the outbreak of hostilities, after we heard that the army had decided to gradually open them.

The usual way was by turning off from highway #55 to Azzun and immediately turning right in order to go through the tunnel under the road and from there northward to the Tulkarm road.  One would arrive in Jayyus in 10 minutes and from there onwards to Kufr Jammal, Falamiya and the other villages.  However, the army has closed the tunnel so the road connecting Qalqiliya, Azzun and the villages south of highway #55 with the villages to the north and with Tulkarm has been lengthened five times over.

We travelled the long and complicated way, along highway #55 to Funduk, then turned left (north) before the main junction by way of the roads in the village we got to Ha'ja.  We continued to Kor and westward from there to Sur and south through Kufr Jamal in the direction of Falamiya.  This route, which used to be quiet, has turned into the main highway.

We stopped at Suhir's in Kufr Jammal, and he told us that the situation is difficult, even though they are relatively lucky as they have no settlements nearby.  Of course, the army frequently enters the village, but there are no problems.  His wife joined us and one of his sons brought coffee.  The shelves in his store, which used to be loaded with everything, were almost empty.  The older son, a father of 2 children, is arrested.  He had been caught working in Israel. During the whole period while we were there, only one client entered to buy a carton of eggs.  She asked about the son, tears gathered in his mother's eyes as she quietly wiped them off.

Suhir was quite upset that we were driving around in a car with Israeli plates and insisted on accompanying us to all three of the checkpoints serving the residents of Falamiya, Kufr Jammal and Jayyus who have to get to their fields which the Fence had cut off from the residents.  Meanwhile only the middle one (north Jayyus 935) is open 3 times a day, but very few people (according to him, 10) have received permits to work there.

We travelled first of all to the Falamiya checkpoint (914).  The gate has been closed for 10 months, boulders block the way and the fence has been made higher.  We returned on our path in order to get to the gate of north Jayyus (935), the only one that has been open for the past week, 3 times a day, but only for a small group of privileged land owners, seemingly those who have a particularly large tract of land; up until the opening of this gate, they had been allowed to use the Zufim checkpoint.

On the way, we passed before an impressive building within a large compound:  a horse farm which had been built on an area that was returned after the moving of the fence westward by order of the High Court, by a resident of Kfar Kassem.  We brought Suhir back to Kufr Jammal and we returned the long way to highway #55.

After we were stopped for an inspection (opening of the doors and asking how we were doing) at the Eliyahu checkpoint, we were forced to travel more than 10 kilometers in order to get to the Habla checkpoint, since 2 roundabouts which had made possible a U-turn in order to enter the nurseries to the south of the road had been closed off.  We got to the Habla checkpoint a little after its opening at 13:00.  There were no vehicles or people waiting on our side.  The soldiers were busy with preparations;  on the Habla side, a few people and vehicles were waiting, mainly a large truck with lumber.  Also here we noticed that the fence was built higher than before.

The soldiers were heavily armed and did not allow us to photograph and, after lengthy conversations on the phone, since we insisted that we were allowed to be there and to photograph, they announced that we were not allowed to be there at all and, if they saw us again, they would call the police. They also refused to take care of the passage of the Palestinians until we went away.  In this way, another soldier also threatened Mustafa that he had better leave the area.

Perhaps it is necessary to get another permit giving us the right to stand at the checkpoints.