Awarta, Beit Furik, Burin (Yitzhar), Huwwara, Za'tara (Tapuah), Thu 21.2.08, Morning

Place:

'Awarta

Beit Furik

Za'tara (Tapuah)

Huwwara

Tags:

Observers:

Reporting: Esti V. and Navah A.

Feb-21-2008

Morning

Translation: Rachel B.

"The sun shone, the almond tree flowered..." and the checkpoints are still there.
Finally, the Golani soldiers have left us and ... "the Nahal has gone out to the fields."

6:45 AM
There is no security check by the Border Police at the Shomron Gate.
The entrance to Marda is open. The blockade at Zeita continues.

Za'tara/Tapu'ach Junction 7:00 AM
There are 7 cars waiting from the western approach and a very long line from the direction of Huwwara - about 60 cars.
At the checkpoint there are Reserve Duty soldiers and a fair number of female soldiers. Also a dog handler. The "segregation" continues: residents of Tul Karem and Jenin between the ages of 16 and 35 are forbidden to go through, along with those against whom there are specific warnings.

7:20 AM A third processing position is opened.
[Two young men, A. b. A. (24) and N. S. try to go through to Ramallah where they work. But they are sent back because of the segregation.]
All the buses and some of the minibuses are sent to the plaza f to be checked. Every bag is opened for the dog to smell its contents. Luckily it's not raining.

Beita Junction 7:40 AM
There are dozens of soldiers and army vehicles. They are not letting people go into the village and the market has been shut down. The soldiers {say}: "There was some shooting here so we have ‘cleaned out' the area."

Yitzhar/Burin Junction 7:50 AM
There is no checkpoint operating.

At Huwwara:
The Nahal soldiers are much more easy-going than their predecessors. They don't fight with us over the white line. Since the shooting at the bus, there are new procedures - they check the ID cards of anyone going into Nablus.
{At the checkpoint} There is a scanner, a dog handler, and no detainees info-icon . The District Coordinating Office Commander arrives and goes to check if there has been a status change in the segregation order.

Awarta 8:10 AM
There are short lines of trucks from both directions. While we stand next to the "café" and wait with Mohamed for oil and olives, a soldier arrives and informs us that we are in "Area A," which is forbidden to Israelis. We promise to leave shortly and he returns to his station. Mohammed says that now the checkpoint is "good."

Beit Furik 8:30 AM
A truck whose driver dared to go up the road that leads to the soldiers' position is waiting on the side as "punishment." (The driver says that it has been more than 3 hours - since 6:30 AM, and the soldier says it's been since 7:30 AM.)
There are a few pedestrians and a line of 12 cars at the exit from the village. The soldiers say they cannot open another processing position.

Huwwara: 9:00 AM
Everything is as is usual. The District Coordinating Office Commander says there is no change in the segregation policy.
In the town of Huwwara things seems to be "business as usual."

By now, most of the soldiers and vehicles have left the entrance to the village of Beita. Those remaining at the spot block the entrance. They say that the military action in the village has not ended yet. They hope that by the afternoon they can open up the junction.

Tapu'ach/Za'tara Junction 9:15 AM
There is no line.
At the Shomron Gate the Border Police is checking people exiting from Israel.

Location Description

Checkpoint Beit Furik

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One of the three internal checkpoints that closed on the city of Nablus - Beit Furik to the east, Hawara to the south, Beit Iba to the west.
The checkpoint is located at the junction of Roads 557 (an apartheid road that was forbidden for Palestinians), leading to the Itamar and Alon Morea settlements and Road 5487. The checkpoint was established in 2001 for pedestrians and vehicles; The opening hours were short and the transition was slow and very problematic.

Allegedly, the checkpoint is intended to monitor the movement to and from Nablus of the residents of Beit Furik and Beit Dajan, being the only opening outside their villages.
Since May 2009 the checkpoint is open 24 hours a day, the military presence is limited, vehicles can pass through it without inspections, except for random inspections. (Updated April 2010)

Za'tara (Tapuah) Checkpoint

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Za'atara is an internal checkpoint in the heart of the West Bank, at the intersection of Road 60 and Road 505 (Trans-Samaria), east of the Tapuach settlement.
This checkpoint is the "border" marked by the IDF between the north and south of the West Bank, in accordance with the policy of separation between the two parts of the West Bank that has been in place since December 2005.

At the Za'atara checkpoint, there are separate routes for Israelis and Palestinians. In the route for Israelis, there are no inspections and the route for Palestinians inspects. The queue lengthens and shortens suits.

The checkpoint is open 24 hours a day. The checkpoint is partially staffed and the people who pass through it are checked at random.

Sep-28-2023

Shoshi Anbar

Za'atra (Tapuah Intersection). Signs

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Huwwara - the checkpoint and the township

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The Huwwara checkpoint is an internal checkpoint south of the city of Nablus, at the intersection of Roads 60 and 5077 (between the settlements of Bracha and Itamar). This checkpoint was one of the four permanent checkpoints info-icon that closed on Nablus (Beit Furik and Awarta checkpoints to the east and the Beit Iba checkpoint to the west). It was a pedestrian-only barrier. As MachsomWatch volunteers, we watched therre since 2001 two shifts a day - morning and noon, the thousands of Palestinians leaving Nablus and waiting for hours in queues to reach anywhere else in the West Bank, from the other side of the checkpoint the destination could only be reached by public transport.
In early June 2009, as part of the easing of Palestinian traffic in the West Bank, the checkpoint was opened to vehicular traffic. The passage today is free, but there is still a military presence in the guard tower and vehicle inspections are done from time to time.

On February 26, 2023, about 400 settlers attacked the town's residents for 5 hours and set fire to property, such as houses and cars. Disturbances occurred in response to a shooting of two Jewish residents of Har Bracha by a Palestinian Terrorist. The soldiers stationed in the town did not prevent the arson and rescued Palestinian families from their homes only after they were set on fire. No one was punished and Finance Minister Smotrich stated that "the State of Israel should wipe out Hawara." Left and center organizations organized solidarity demonstrations and support actions for the residents of Hawara.

Hawara continued to be in the headlines in all the months that followed: more pogroms by the settlers, attacks by Palestinians and a massive presence of the army in the town. It amounted to a de facto curfew of commerce and life in the center of the city. On October 5, 2023, MK Zvi established a Sukkah in the center of Hawara and hundreds of settlers backed the army blocked the main road and held prayers in the heart of the town all night and the next day. On Saturday, October 7, 23 The "Swords of Iron" war began with an attack by Hamas on settlements surrounding Gaza in the face of a poor presence of the IDF. Much criticism has been made of the withdrawal of military forces from the area surrounding Gaza and their placement in the West Bank, and in the Hawara and Samaria region in particular, as a shield for the settlers who were taking over and rioting.

On November 12, 2023, the first section of the Hawara bypass road intended for Israeli traffic only was opened. In this way, the settlers can bypass the road that goes through the center of Hawara, which is the main artery for traffic from the Nablus area to Ramallah and the south of the West Bank. For the construction of the road, the Civil Administration info-icon expropriated 406 dunams of private land belonging to Palestinians from the nearby villages. The settlers are not satisfied with this at the moment, and demand to also travel through Hawara itself in order to demonstrate presence and control.

(updated November 2023)

Feb-29-2024

Nina Seba

Huwara checkpoint - the gate is closed

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Burin (Yitzhar)

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Burin

This is a Palestinian village in the Nablus governorate, a little south of Nablus, on the main road passing through the West Bank. The settlements: Yitzhar and Har Bracha, settled in locations that surrounded the village, placed fences so it is cut off the main road.

There are around 4000 inhabitants. Most of them are engaged in agriculture and pasture, although many graduates of the two secondary schools continue to study at the university. Academic positions are hardly available, they find work as builderd, or leave for the Gulf countries.

The village lands were appropriated several times for the establishment of Israeli settlements and military bases, and as a result, Burin's land and water resources dwindled. lSince 1982, more than 2,000 dunams of village land have been declared "state land" and then transferred to Har Bracha settlement.

Over the past few years and more so since 2017, the villagers have been terrorized by the residents of Yitzhar and Har Bracha, the Givat Ronen outpost and others.
Despite the close proximity of soldiers to an IDF base close to one of the village's schools, residents are suffering from numerous stone-throwing events, vehicle and fire arson, also reported in the press.

In 2023, the prevention of the olive harvest in the village plot was more violent than ever. Soldiers and settlers walked with drawn weapons between the houses of the village and demanded that people stop harvesting in the village itself and in the private plots outside the village. The settlers from Yitzhar and Giv'at Roned raided the olive groves and stole crops. 300 olive trees belonging to the residents of Burin, near Yitzhar, were uprooted. The loss of livelihood from the olives causes long-term economic damage to the farmers' families, bringing them to the point of starvation.

(updated for November 2023)