Falamiya, Jayyus

Falamya/New Juyyus

A one-hour-delay until the gate opens. Two people from the West Bank tell us that in the aftermath of the "Tzuk Eitan" operation an organization is calling for a ban on Israeli food products. But we see Israeli products in the containers.

06:20 Falamya/Juyyus in the new fence (It replaces the old Falamya gate, it is mostly used by people from Juyyus)

The soldiers open the gate but close it again and call the people back. The reason is an incident somewhere along the fence. All the people are from Juyyus. They complain that there are people who sneak through the fence, and that's why they close the gate here, even though the locals have nothing to do with it.

They need new permits for this gate. In the meantime they cross with the old ones. They have applied for new ones and are waiting for them to be issued. There is also a problem with a well on the Israeli side of the fence. They want to operate it with electricity instead of diesel oil, but the change has not been approved.

06:45 (The gate should have opened half an hour ago). We call the DCO and the advanced command post, and the answer is that there is an incident somewhere along the fence. The gate won't open until the problem is solved. It won't take long. The people waiting are getting annoyed, they want to pass through and begin working before it gets too hot. All the people at this gate are from Juyyus which is situated 6-7 kilometers from here. After they drive here and cross the gate, they have to return a few kilometers to the south in order to reach their land bordering on southern Juyyus. (The gate at Juyyus is situated far away, north west of Juyyus  and the northern gate at Juyyus does not open any longer.)

07:25 The gate opens after a one-hour delay. Cars, tractors and even small trucks are passing through. People who do not have cars hitchhike with their neighbors. After passing through the gate the vehicles drive on to the south or to the north to enter the plantations. Some people walk from here.  One man is detained. It appears that his permit expired a year ago. A female soldier confiscates his permit.

We drive to the old security fence which has been abandoned since the fence further west opened in the direction of the northern Juyyus gate.  But a few meters before the gate the new fence connects to the old one, so it is impossible to reach the southern Juyyus gate, which has been opened by the soldiers who have just closed the new gate (935). We miss the new gate because we have to make a long detour through Falamya. We drive to the gate at the outskirts of Falamya. It opens before the new gate between 05:30-06:15 in the morning, for half an hour at noon and half an hour in the evening. Most villagers from Falamya and Kafr Jammal use this gate. From here they can continue to their fields and plantations which they can reach now since the fence has been moved. The rest pass through the gate at Kafr Jammal near Salit. The locals complain that they cannot just enter to turn on the irrigation and then to return. They get stuck and have to wait for the gate to open at noon. In short, life is hard as usual.