Huwwara checkpoint, daily suffering for the Palestinian residents

If you are in Nablus, and considering heading elsewhere, you will be stopped a military checkpoint, installed by the border guards unit, 150 meter away from Huwwara checkpoint.

 

This checkpoint marks your first step of a journey of suffering. Soldiers on that checkpoint stop and search the residents depending on different criterions; sometimes they stop the residents according to sex, age, or even the way they look like.

 

Scenes of soldiers chasing Taxis there became a familiar issue to the residents who need to cross on daily basis while heading to their work, educational facilities or elsewhere.

 

Mahmoud Abdullah was heading back home, to Qaryout village south of Nablus when he was stopped by an Israeli army vehicles; soldiers instructed him to wait at the side of the street after taking his identity card.

 

He was waiting alone…at least for a while, but late on soldiers started stooping the residents, and ordering them to wait, female university students, employees, teachers and any resident who wanted to cross. “One of the soldiers was writing down, names and identity card numbers”, Abdullah said, “Another soldier was stopping every female student who wanted to pass, and collected their identity cards”.

 

The residents remained there waiting to be allowed to pass, and reach Huwwara checkpoint before they finally can go back home. But then they discovered the “real deal”; hundreds of residents, if not more, were lined up at Huwwara checkpoint, waiting since several hours.

 

There is no way back, even if they wanted to, now after crossing the first checkpoint the became trapped between it and Huwwara checkpoint, which became more or less like a border crossing which leads you to Nablus.

 

There, at Huwwara checkpoint, hundreds of residents were waiting, even school children who were not able to go back home as a result of the harsh military procedures. The soldiers there do not speak much; they keep yelling “go back, go back”, and mostly use their gun to point at the residents “to instruct them what to do and were to go” while waiting their turn to be searched.

 

Four weeks ago, a Palestinian woman identified as Haifa’ Hindiyya was shot and killed at the checkpoint after the soldiers claimed that she intended to stab a female soldier. After this incident, the soldiers placed fortified glass barriers there and provided the female soldiers with computers which contained lists of “wanted” residents. Yet, even after managing to pass through the checkpoint, and all of the procedures of humiliation, searches, and interrogation, you will face other soldiers and jeeps chasing the residents and forcing them away.

 

Several days ago, during evening hours, and as residents were heading back home after a long day of work and Ramadan fasting, and after spending a long time waiting on Huwwara checkpoint and the checkpoint which preceded it, the dozens of residents faced another checkpoint which was installed by a military jeep 200 meters away.

 

The soldiers parked their jeep in the middle of the street, and told the residents that there is a bomb there. The residents, after waiting for an additional period, were told later on that this was only a training procedure the soldiers were conducting.

 

It was almost five in the evening on the 15th day of Ramadan when hundreds of cars returning to Nablus were met by a flying checkpoint at the entrance to Burin, 200 meters from Huwwara checkpoint. There was chaos and screaming at the soldiers by people in a rush to make the evening meal until soldiers suddenly announced the checkpoint had been closed completely under the pretext that there was a bomb.

 

Right before it was time for the fasters to break their fast, the checkpoint was opened. On the departing end of the checkpoint, buses of pilgrims headed for Mecca waited as the soldiers slowly checked ID cards. For them, the evening meal was taken in their seats on the bus, waiting to cross.

 

There, at Huwwara checkpoint, as well as dozens of similar checkpoint installed in the West Bank, the situation became similar to a border crossing controlled by the Israeli army. Every time the residents manage to cross, they start congratulating each other for a “safe return” back home after a long day of traveling. A long day of traveling, which actually does not take them far away, yet it remains a risky day of traveling controlled by the mood of the soldiers, by their training procedures and their heartless orders.