Barta'a - additional parking is being arranged on the Palestinian side

Place:

'Anin

Barta'a-Reihan

Tura-Shaked

Ya'bed-Dotan

Observers:

Hanna Heller (photos), Neta Golan (report), Tal Haran (translate)

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Feb-22-2023

Afternoon

Neta with women returning from family visit to Umm El Fahm

Photo:

Hanna Heller

'Anin checkpoint opens and the crossing begins

Photo:

Hanna Heller

15:00 Anin Checkpoint

A male and a female soldier guard the fence. Naturally they have no key to the checkpoint gate. Dozens of people, 4 women and 2 tractors are waiting. We are told that in the morning the gate was opened at 7:10 a.m. and about 120 people passed. We speak with the women a bit. Two of them are young, one speaks English and asks us if we are Israelis and from where. We are from Haifa. So was her late grandfather. The other two, the older women, are his daughters. All four live in Palestinian Anin, and are returning from a family visit in the Israeli town of Umm Al Fahm.

15:20

A military policeman and a policewoman arrive to open the gate of the checkpoint. They have the key. The gate has been changed, probably as part of the “improvement” of this part of the separation fence. The Anin villagers stand in two lines, a kind of new procedure, and pass the checkpoint.

15:50 Ya’abad-Dotan Checkpoint

We cross the separation fence at the Barta’a Checkpoint and park near the checkpoint which is located inside the Palestinian area, on the road to Jenin, near the junction leading to Mevo Dotan colony. The checkpoint is unmanned apparently, and vehicle traffic is unhampered.

Barta'a CP - preparing additional parking on Palestinian side

Photo:

Hanna Heller

16:10 Barta’a-Reihan, Palestinian side

The large car park, the lots below Zabda village and the roadsides are filled with cars. Some park even in the part of the car park opposite Zabda whose preparation has not yet been completed. We understood that a day’s parking in the large park costs 10 NIS. The price of a parking subscription at the guarded car parks costs 400 NIS a month. Near the checkpoint shed people sell strawberries, peanuts and cake. Three children sell coffee out of thermos bottles, the snack truck is open. Many return from their workplaces inside Israel proper and the seam zone. One tells us about his brother, prevented from entering Israel (blacklisted). We give him Sylvia’s card and wish him luck. One of the drivers tells us that today the Israeli army killed 10 people in Nablus. All were young, except for one, about 70 years old.

16:45 Toura-Shaked Checkpoint

All quiet, nearly empty. Only one person is waiting in the shed for his transport. Others return home in the West Bank from their workplaces.

17:00

On our way home, in the car, we hear on the news that in the Israeli army’s activity inside Nablus, ten people were killed – of them 8 ‘wanted men’ and 2 ‘uninvolved’. The older man is probably one of them.

Location Description

Anin agricultural checkpoint

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located on the Separation Fence east of the Israeli community Mei Ami and close to the village of Anin in the West Bank. It is opened twice a week, morning and afternoon, for periods of time that are growing shorter Lith time. It is meant for Anin farmers whose olive groves have been separated from the village by the fence. Transit permits are only issued to those who can produce ownership documents for their caged-in land, and sometimes only to the head of the family or his widow, eldest son and children. At times the inheritors lose their right to tend to the family’s land. The permits are eked out and are re-issued only with difficulty. 55-year old persons may cross the checkpoint (into Israel) without special permits. During the olive harvest season (about one month around October) the checkpoint is open every day and more transit permits are issued. Names of persons eligible to cross are held in the soldiers’ computers. In July 2007, a sweeping instruction was issued according to which whoever does not return to the village through this checkpoint in the afternoon will be stripped of his transit permit when he shows up there next time. Since 2019, the checkpoint has not been allways locked with the seam-line zone gate (1 of 3 gates info-icon ), and the fence around it has been broken in several sites.

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)