After Israel shuts only West Bank gateway to the outside world, Palestinians fear more restrictions

By Mostafa Salem, Abeer Salman, CNN

(CNN) — Israel’s sudden decision to indefinitely close the sole land crossing giving over 3 million Palestinians in the occupied West Bank access to international travel, has intensified fears of more restrictions amid Israel’s threats of retaliation against Western recognition of a Palestinian state.

The closure of the crossing has stranded Palestinians abroad, while patients receiving medical treatment in Jordan were forced to extend their stays on limited budgets. Families have been separated by Israel’s abrupt decision, and thousands remain uncertain about when the border will reopen.

Ismail Tamimi, a father in Jordan, said the closure of the border has separated him from his young daughters, who were visiting family in the city of Hebron in the West Bank.

“One of my daughters is diabetic. … She missed her checkup today in Jordan, and I cannot bring her to come here because the border is shut,” he said, adding that “schools are also starting, so my children will miss the start.”

Another Palestinian man from Hebron, Rami Al Quwasmi, said he had to rent a house in Jordan as he awaits the reopening of the border.

“I don’t know where to go, there are thousands of others like me,” he said. More than half of Jordan’s population of 10 million is of Palestinian descent, and the country is home to more than 2 million registered Palestinian refugees.

The Israeli government, which controls the border crossing, has yet to say why the border was shut. The Israel Airports Authority, which administers the crossing, says it was a decision made by the political echelon. It comes several days after a Jordanian truck driver transporting humanitarian aid intended for Gaza opened fire at the crossing, killing two Israeli soldiers. The Israeli military said they would investigate the incident.

Palestinians feel the closure is retaliatory and designed to punish them for a decision taken by several western countries this week to recognize Palestine as an independent country.

“It’s revenge against the people, and it closely resembles the checkpoints spread throughout the West Bank. This makes us feel like we are living in a large prison,” a Palestinian journalist living in the West Bank, Tharwat Shaqra told CNN.

Britain, France, Canada, Australia and several other Western nations formally declared their recognition of a Palestinian state on Monday, a move furiously condemned by Israel and its Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who said the decision will give a “massive prize to terror”.

For decades, Palestinians have relied on the Allenby Crossing, also known as the King Hussein Bridge or Al-Karama Crossing, as the main route to exit the West Bank without having to enter Israel. Travelers from the West Bank typically use the crossing to access international airports in neighboring Jordan, visit family residing in the country or receive medical treatment.

The bridge was named after British General Edmund Allenby, who led Allied forces to capture Palestine from the Ottoman Empire more than a century ago. It was destroyed multiple times throughout its history, including by a 1927 earthquake, a 1946 attack by Jewish paramilitaries and during the 1967 Six-Day War between Israel and Arab states.

Israel has controlled the bridge since that war and shuts it on religious holidays, or because of security concerns. Last week, the crossing was closed following the death of the two Israeli soldiers before it was reopened a few days later. A similar attack last year also led to the crossing’s closure.

But Israel’s latest decision to shut the crossing, described as an indefinite closure, has sparked concern among Palestinians, who say it appears to be part of a pattern of measures taken recently to confine Palestinians.

“Students cannot go to their universities, and those studying abroad cannot return. Families have been torn apart,” a prominent Palestinian politician Mustafa Barghouti told CNN before adding that “patients who need treatment in Jordan are now banned from travel.”

The Israeli government has discussed the possibility of annexing all or part of the West Bank, and far-right ministers have pushed for a complete annexation. It has built more roadblocks and installed dozens of iron gates across the occupied territory, making movement difficult inside.

“This is making all the small towns and villages into smaller prisons and ghettos as part of Israel‘s plan to divide the land and pressure the people to eventually leave Palestine,” Barghouti said.

The bridge gives Palestinian territories an economic lifeline, delivering critical goods to the struggling region, and more recently, allowing trucks to transport critical humanitarian aid from Jordan to Gaza – the Palestinian enclave devastated by Israel’s military campaign launched in retaliation for a deadly attack on Israeli cities launched nearly two years ago by Hamas – the Palestinian militant group that killed 1,200 people and took 251 people hostage on that day.

“The border’s closure is collective punishment and it is a disoriented measure by Netanyahu who has led Israel to international isolation,” Ahmad Tibi, an Arab Knesset member, told CNN.

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