Northern Checkpoints: The story of a 12-year-old girl who went to visit her grandmother and ended up at the DCO
12:15-14:45
12:15 – Tura – Shaked Checkpoint
The gate was locked. We forgot that it would be locked because we are not used to being here at this time of day. The soldiers arrived and opened the checkpoint after 7 minutes. We hoped to see the children from Dahar Al Malec returning home, but only one 6-year-old boy crossed the checkpoint alone. A little girl crossed with her mother and there were a few cars. We learned that the older children were attending matriculation examinations in Arabic and mathematics today and were using the classrooms in the elementary school for the examinations. We drove to Hirbet al Radiyeh that still has no electricity. Marina brought a large avocado sapling that she had promised her friend there. We bought wonderful olives and drove back to Tura Checkpoint to see if the children had arrived. The checkpoint was quiet and three nicely dressed young people were crossing the field towards the lone house.
13:35 – Barta’a –Reihan Checkpoint
We parked in the Palestinian parking lot. The drivers greeted us with a surprising story about H., a young man we know who used to have a stall here and now works as a driver. We know him as a cheerful person and his friends describe him as being a bit crazy. He is now jailed in Jenin after surrendering himself to the police there. He stabbed a driver from Emricha who was antagonizing him. The driver was slightly injured in the face and leg and has been released from the hospital. If they agree upon a sulha – [a ceremony in which two rival parties agree to end hostilities] he will serve only a few months, and if not he will serve five years in prison. The family of the man who was stabbed has not agreed to hold a sulha.
At 14:20 the seamstresses from Barta’a began to arrive and we began to hear about a serious incident that happened recently to a person who spoke fluent Hebrew and his family. The person relating the story lived in an isolated house next to a carob grove between Yaabed and Tura. His 12-year-old daughter left one evening to go to her grandmother’s house about 100 meters away. When she heard noise among the trees she thought there were wild pigs and attempted to drive them away by throwing stones. Several soldiers emerged, caught her, and took her to the military camp at Dotan where they accused her of throwing stones at them and called them pigs. Members of her family searched for her for hours and finally notified the Palestinian Authority, who in turn approached other authorities and the girl was returned to her family at Salem Liaison and Coordination Administration the following morning. Her father explained that his daughter had not been harmed and was not even frightened. The family underwent a frightening night. We are left to ask ourselves a lot of questions about the I.D.F.
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).
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Tura-Shaked
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Tura-Shaked
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-21-2022Anin Checkpoint: A magnificent breach in the center of the checkpoint
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