'Anin, Barta'a-Reihan, Tura-Shaked, Ya'bed-Dotan

Place:

Barta'a-Reihan

Tura-Shaked

'Anin

Ya'bed-Dotan

Tags:

Slow passage

DCO (District Coordination Offices)

Seam Zone

Palestinian farmers

School Children

Observers:

Roni Shalit, Idit, Neta Golan (Reporting). Translation: Bracha Ben-Avraham

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Nov-17-2014

Morning

06:00 – A'anin Checkpoint

Yesterday I called the Liaison and Coordination Administration and was told that the checkpoint would open at 06:00, as it had before the olive harvest, but when we arrived we found a deserted checkpoint and no soldiers. I called the Liaison and Coordination Administration and was told that the checkpoint would be open from 06:30 to 07:00. At exactly 06:30 a white car from the Liaison and Coordination Administration and a military vehicle arrived and the checkpoint opened.

The first person crossed at 06:35. At 06:50 a donkey arrives carrying several schoolbags, followed by a boy and several girls. They are Bedouin children who live in the encampment below the checkpoint. They are waiting for their ride to school in Um A-Reihan.

At 07:05 two dozen people and a few tractors crossed. The people were not aware of the changes in the opening hours at the checkpoint.

Shaked – Tura Checkpoint 07:15

We drove carefully because we’ve arrived as children were walking along the side of the road to school. There is no sidewalk. One of the people crossing to the seamline zone complained that yesterday the checkpoint did not open until 08:00because there was no electricity, and the soldiers were not allowed to record people's names by hand. He added that this morning the inspection was unusually meticulous.

07:55 – Yaabed Dotan Checkpoint

There is a line of ten cars waiting to drive through the checkpoint in both directions. Suddenly the drivers going in the direction of Yaabed and Jenin are allowed through, and the line disappears. One person remarks that "they are only letting people through quickly because you are here."

Perhaps this is true. One of the drivers, who is the head of the Barta'a Regional Council, says that the checkpoint has been manned by soldiers until 23:00 for the past two months, but sometimes at noon they have to wait for more than an hour.

The line going in the other direction is not moving, and when it does it doesn’t get any shorter because more cars keep coming. At 08:20 we leave, but there is still a waiting line. It is important to visit this checkpoint!

08:40 – Reihan – Barta'a Checkpoint, the Palestinian Side

The parking lot is crowded as usual. We park by the side of the road among the Palestinian cars. Four vans loaded with agricultural produce are waiting in the small Palestinian waiting area in front of the inspection facility. Seven others are waiting by the side of the road. The Palestinian, who had operated the coffee stand until he was ordered to close, when the settler from Hermesh opened his kiosk, is now working at cleaning the checkpoint. He still hopes that he will be allowed to reopen his coffee stand.

Drivers are complaining about the delay at Yaabed Checkpoint. One says that he is a Bedouin and that his cousins who live in Israel serve in the IDF as trackers – a scene from the absurd reality in Israel.

09:10 – Reihan – Barta'a Checkpoint, Seamline Zone Side

We are told that there are about 50 people in the terminal and that it takes as long as 20 minutes to a half hour or more to get through. A few people are crossing to the West Bank. Here, too, drivers complain about Yaabed Checkpoint. As we ascend the sleeve info-icon the kiosk owner from the settlement of Hermesh begins shouting for reasons that are not clear.

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)