An order implementing the Israeli closure of all but 11 border crossings into the Palestinian West Bank was put in place on Thursday, prohibiting Palestinians from crossing in other places, due to ‘increased security’. The smaller crossings, many of them gates that allow Palestinian farmers to access their fields and olive groves, are in the West Bank, but on the Israeli-controlled side of the arbitrary de facto ‘border’ created by the Israeli annexation wall.The only crossings that remain open are those that have been enhanced with high-tech security mechanisms through a grant last year from the U.S. government. Palestinians fear that this ‘temporary’ closure is an indication of what will later become a permanent Israeli policy of closure, creating a new border for the Israeli state that annexes almost 50% of the land base of the current Palestinian terrotory in the West Bank.
