# PALESTINE /// The Route 443, a symptomatic example of the apartheid apparatus in the West Bank
Published
map extracted from the OCHA map: the green line is the 1949 armistice line separating Israel from the legal Palestinian territory, purple stains are settlements, orange stains are Palestinian villages, the thick red line is the separation barrier, circles are checkpoints, blue lines are Israeli roads and yellow lines are Palestinian roads. It goes without saying that every Israeli construction beyond the green line (here, pretty much the totality of this map) constitute a violation of the International Law.
In my research about the Israeli apartheid apparatuses against Palestinians of the West Bank, I encountered the Route 443 as a particularly symptomatic piece of infrastructure that illustrates well the territorial segregation implemented in the West Bank and in East Jerusalem. This road is indeed a high speed axis for Israeli settlers and army to maximize their movement within the West Bank. This segregation allows for the Israelis, a total denial of the Palestinians’ existence. Route 443 is also symptomatic of such a denial by the presence of two high lateral walls (see photographs below), that hide from the cars the existing Palestinian villages around.
This highway crosses a corridor of Israeli illegal settlements in order to link them both with other settlements in East Jerusalem (East) and some other in the West part of the West Bank. Palestinians also have a road in order to reach this little piece of land imprisoned by the barrier. This road is narrow, framed by tall walls and barbel wires and goes under the settlements thus materializing the several layers of circulation the West Bank is characterized by. Of course, this road could not be easier to close by the I.D.F. that can then control the Palestinian circulation as they have learned to do in the frame of a strategical apartheid policy.
The following photographs and film have been taken by Israel based director of photography Amir Terkel who was kind enough to authorize me to use those documents.
Route 443 for the Israeli settlers and army:
…and the Palestinian “underground” equivalent:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRTo-gBT–A]