'Anin, Reihan, Shaked, Thu 22.1.09, Afternoon

Place:

Barta'a-Reihan

Tura-Shaked

'Anin

Tags:

Seam Zone

Observers:

Neta G., Bracha B. (reporting), Shuli H. (Guest)

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Jan-22-2009

Afternoon

15:05: A’anin cp

When we arrived the gate was still closed, and a line of half a dozen tractors and wagons was waiting on the road. About fifty people, including children who are on vacation from school, were congregated in front of the gate waiting to get through.

When we approached the gate someone immediately came up to us and complained that people’s agricultural permits had expired and that they were being refused new ones. We saw that several people at the gate were examining some printed pages and maps that had been hung on the gate in a plastic envelope. The pages and map, written in Hebrew, were a new version of the land designation in the area and described what land was “ours” and what was “theirs.” We were told that the same pages were available in Arabic at the next gate on the other side. People were worried that more areas would be proclaimed as belonging to Israel, but the map was evidently no different from the previous 2003 version.

The soldiers open the gates info-icon just wide enough to let the tractors pass through, and then close them again, leaving a small opening for people to pass. The crowd of people in front of the gates moves through quickly as ID cards are checked. A hummer drives up and a soldier jumps out, swaggers up to the gate, and viciously kicks it open with his foot to allow the hummer to drive through. He then swings the gate shut again, but not without issuing a nasty comment to us about how good it is that we are here, showing our concern for the wrong citizens. As the hummer drives away up the dirt road we hear the soldier’s voice shouting loudly down to us over the roar of the motor: “Smolaneeeeem! Smolaneeeeem!” (Leftists! Leftists!) We smile and wave as it drives away.

A vehicle approaches and the driver is stopped beyond the first gate. We ask why he is being held up and we are told that there is some problem with his permit. What will happen to him? How long will he be detained? We wait and wait, but nothing happens, and we finally give up and leave at 15:50.

Shaked-Tura: 15:55

Shaked checkpoint is quiet, since there is no school today. A lawyer from the nearby village passes through, and a woman student, but there is no traffic. We left after ten minutes and continued to Reihan.

Reihan-Barta’a 16:05

One vehicle is being checked in the shed when we arrive, and the lower parking lot is completely full. People are coming back from work and a steady stream of people is coming out of the terminal, but they inform us that they got through quickly. People are carrying bags of oranges and food coolers: one man was even carrying a television set.

We walk through the sleeve info-icon to the entrance to the terminal. A metal partition with signs in Arabic (reported previously) divide the line into two, but since both signs in Arabic are identical, we can’t figure out what the separation barrier is supposed to accomplish.

A large group of about 50 workers comes down the sleeve and congregates in front of the carousel. I begin to take pictures of the waiting crowd. The checkpoint manager calls us over, politely introduced himself as A, and asks if I took pictures of the inside of the terminal. I tell him the truth: I took pictures of people in the sleeve and photographed the signs. He demands my camera info-icon , and claims that we are not allowed to photograph and that I “breached trust”. I object that there was no trust to be broken, since we were not told that taking pictures was forbidden. My shift-mate explains that according to the IDF spokesman we are allowed to take pictures. What’s more - we have a website already filled with photographs of the Reihan checkpoint! He will not relent. I hand him my camera through the bars and he systematically erases all the pictures of the Reihan checkpoint, including the one I took of the ridiculous plastic playground equipment in the entrance. We turn to go, and we wonder what he has to hide that makes him so reluctant for us to document our visit.

On the way out we are stopped twice: once by a man who pleads with us to help his father who has heart trouble get into an Israeli hospital (We give him the phone number of Doctors for Human rights) and once by a man who asks us to help renew a work permit so that his relative can go back to work: because the family has no other breadwinner. We can do little, but we take his phone number and promise to try and help.

What else can we do? The arm of the occupation is very long.

We left at 17:00.

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).