The dreams and wishes of the young man Baraa Farid Abu Zuhair faded away at the gate of Al-Karama Crossing on the Jordanian-Palestinian border following an Israeli decision preventing him from traveling abroad again to look for work as a result of the difficult economic conditions and in light of the tightened security against the people of the West Bank by Israel which strangled the economy and left markets vulnerable.
Abu Dhaher 27 from Nablus in the northern West Bank is one of the Palestinian residents of the West Bank who returned from Turkey after a temporary work trip.
It is the journey of torment a trap for young people or if you wish the journey of stripping off dignity. These descriptions are used by the Palestinians who are suffering from the humiliation of the Israeli occupation by depriving them of their dignity through humiliating strip searches and/or arrests whether during their arrival or departure.
Abu Dhaher told the Palestinian Information Center the details of his journey at Al-Karama Crossing after the occupation released him in 2017. He was arrested and transferred to a camp near Jericho then he was transferred to the Petah Tikva interrogation center after he crossed the border on his way back to Palestine.
“When I tried to travel abroad through Al-Karama Crossing I was blocked. When I asked why I was told it was for security reasons. I did not get a convincing answer. I had gone through a very tough interrogation about the reason why I travelled” he said.
He added: “I was arrested by the occupation for 18 months and was released in 2017. Preventing me from travel made me live in a big prison.”
Other stories of humiliation!
The Israeli occupation forces also arrested Palestinian TV correspondent Bakr Abdel Haq during his return through Al-Karama Crossing this year. He was interrogated before being released.
Abdel Haq told the Palestinian Information Center that he was arrested during his return to Palestine through Al-Karama Crossing after traveling to Lebanon and Egypt. He received the Arab Youth Award for Media from the League of Arab States and participated in the Fourth International Conference on Solidarity with the Palestinians in Beirut.
Teacher Mofid Jalgoum recalls how he was arrested several years ago at Al-Karama Crossing after returning from a visit to register for a doctorate in history at an Egyptian university. He was interrogated and released after more than a year and a half.
Jalgoum told the Palestinian Information Center that his family members were shocked when he was arrested at the Crossing.
The most prominent detainees at Al-Karama Crossing in the second half of this year were Wassim Murad Rabay’ah who was arrested while traveling to Jordan and Mohammed Abdul Samad Shawahneh who was travelling back to Palestine both from the town of Silat Al-Harthiya west of Jenin.
The Palestinian people continue to live in a series of humiliation and suffering since the occupation of the West Bank in 1967 and the occupation of the borders and crossings at the time. The Israeli occupation authorities have re-built Al-Karama Crossing to serve as a passage between the West Bank and Jordan.
Israel after its occupation of the West Bank in 1967 established a crossing point with Jordan known as the King Hussein Bridge or Al-Karama Crossing (the Arabic word for dignity!) or the Allenby Bridge as the Israelis call it.
The Israeli occupation added another crossing point called the Sheikh Hussein commercial crossing which was allocated for the passage of Israelis and foreign tourists through Jordan in addition to the Palestinian holders of Israeli IDs.
