The northern checkpoints: The tobacco is blossoming again

Place:

Barta'a-Reihan

Tura-Shaked

Ya'bed-Dotan

Tags:

Border Police

Northern checkpoints

Observers:

Rachel Weizman and Ruti Tuval Translation: Naomi Halsted

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Sep-19-2023

Morning

06:35: At the entrance to Harish, Border Policemen are waiting for those coming from the east (seamline zone and West Bank), and inspecting cars apparently at random because the line of cars waiting isn’t particularly long.

06:40 Barta’a-Reihan checkpoint

The intersection, parking lots, and roadsides are full of people and cars. We cross the checkpoint and observe it from the south. The parking lots around it are filling up. People are striding along and climbing up towards the terminal. The large parking lot that has been built by digging into the adjacent hill is still not in use. We park there on powdery white earth.

Barta’a-Reihan Checkpoint, morning.

Photo:

Ruti Tuval

Beside the pillbox (watchtower) at Imreiha junction, a jeep is apparently observing the road. There’s no one manning the guard posts along the way to Ya’bed checkpoint now.

07:10 Ya’bed-Dotan checkpoint

Soldiers in the Golani patrol are manning the checkpoint. They suggest that we come in with the car, make a U-turn and come back in the convoy of cars coming from Jenin. Being used to being kept away from the checkpoint, this is a refreshing novelty for us. Every car going to Area C is detained for a short questioning. A car with a trailer full of goods is detained for extensive questioning.

Yabed-Dotan Checkpoint

Photo:

Ruti Tuval

Upon our return to Barta’a checkpoint, we are asked to show our identity cards (one was enough) and are sent to stand for a while on the red X. As we go round the square, we notice about ten cars waiting in line to go up to the inspection area. Many workers are still coming up the covered sleeve info-icon .

08:00 Tura-Shaked checkpoint

Tura-Shaked, tobacco blossoms near the checkpoint

Photo:

Ruti Tuval

The driver Youssef is waiting for passengers. Cars are arriving from the other side. Drivers are having to wait too long to cross into the West Bank. Two soldiers approach us and ask us not to interfere with them and for our part we ask them not to interfere with one another because people here are in a hurry to get to work. The driver who was waiting is signaled to cross and smiles at us with a nod. An older pedestrian emerges from the sleeve info-icon and asks for toilets to be installed there.

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).

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)