Very crowded at the Barta`a checkpoint every morning

Place:

'Anin

Barta'a-Reihan

Tura-Shaked

Tags:

Crowding

Slow passage

Observers:

Neta Golan, Shuli Bar (report and photos)

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Nov-2-2022

Morning

Daily passage to the harvest brings many fetuses to the Aanin checkpoint

Photo:

Shuli Bar

At the northern entrance to the checkpoint complex in Barta`a

Photo:

Shuli Bar

Slow passage and very crowded in the entrance to the Barta'a checkpoint

Photo:

Shuli Bar

תוצאות הבחירות מלוות אותנו בלב כבד

The recent election results follow us, we are heavy-hearted…

6:15 a.m. Barta’a Checkpoint:

Lots of vehicles at the entrance to the upper area of the checkpoint. Most came to pick up Palestinian workers who have come from all over the West Bank to work, mostly inside Israel. According to the crowding here we can evaluate the pace of passing to the terminal from the lower car park, supposedly on the Palestinian side. Today, in view of the chaos we realized there’s a ‘streaming problem’, passage slowed down.

We went down to the lower car park and discovered an over-filled shed pf people. Turnstiles leading to the terminal are unoperated, movement stopped. Only a quarter of an hour later was passage renewed, and only for 2-3 minutes. In the meantime, more and more workers arrive from all directions, more than passed into the terminal. Inside the shed people are crowded and pressed to each other. We have not seen this shameful sight for a long time now. In spite of the crowding, the atmosphere was relatively peaceful, both inside the shed and around it. We estimated that hundreds of people were standing there at the time.

Here and there complaints were heard of people afraid to be late to work, and that this is an impossible situation to be repeated every morning. Outside the shed stood workers who did not wish to crowd inside, and preferred to wait at the sides until the crowding would dissolve. This happened about half an hour after we arrived.

7:05 a.m. Anin Agricultural Checkpoint

We haven’t yet become accustomed to seeing over one-hundred people crossing this checkpoint to work at the olive harvest and in general. In the not-so-distant past, when the Separation Fence had breaches, a single tractor driver and his son crossed here. All the rest used the breaches. Since these were closed, and since the DCO has provided great numbers of work permits, over a hundred people and more cross here every morning and afternoon. We know many of them, who meet us with obvious delight. Others, mostly young and unknown to us, do not even glance at us. During the present olive harvest month, the checkpoint is opened daily. Later, when this harvest is over things will return to their usual pattern of twice a week, to the dismay of Anin and other villagers.

The breaches are back!

On Monday this week, October 31, 2022 Hannah reported a group of workers detained at the checkpoint in the morning and finally taken away by bus. We met one of these workers, M., who told us that the entire group except for him (most of them not Anin residents) were caught crossing a breach not far from the checkpoint. He crossed the checkpoint unhampered and went to work in his nearby grove: “The army came and shackled me tightly, even though I have a crossing permit and everything is alright”. They were all taken in for questioning at Salem and spent the night there. In the morning they were released. A work day was lost. A night was lost. No one spoke with them at all. M. was traumatized, and asked me for my phone number. For when this will be repeated…

New Directive

Last Wednesday a Palestinian farmer was denied harvesting trees near a new army post. Since the villagers do not dare violate the directives, they gave in and went home. Today and yesterday this order was already removed, apparently thanks to the intervention of a DCO officer. The next day, the farmer finished harvesting his olives peacefully in that area.

Yesterday, election day, the checkpoint was opened as usual, but many farmers thought it wouldn’t and didn’t go to work.

It is a comfort to see families coming out to harvest olives with their women and children, and the kiss blown to us by one of the veteran farmers did the job…

7:30 Toura-Shaked Checkpoint

At the shed, several people wait for their transport. They tell us that this morning the checkpoint was opened at 7:15, as usual, even though the official opening time is 7, and during the olive-harvest month – 6:30 a.m. They complain that although less than 100 people cross this checkpoint, this is always done slowly. Even now we saw a group of people waiting in front of the turnstile on the Toura side, without any obvious reason. We did not see any schoolchildren or teachers. Apparently the children are on their first quarter break. They are probably helping their families in the olive harvest. A minibus arrives to pick up the waiting workers and take them to the nearby Shahak industrial zone.

Two soldiers – a man and a woman – approach us. Who are you? Asks the man, in open despite. He doesn’t know us but commands in an ugly tone: This is a closed military zone and you are not allowed to photograph! They turned around and went back to their post.

We felt bad.

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).