PALESTINE: Few Palestinians expect The Hague court ruling to make much difference to their daily lives, writes Nuala Haughey in Qalqilya, West Bank
Qalqilya was once known as the breadbasket of the West Bank, a thriving market town whose strong economy relied heavily on its agricultural produce.
But for the past year about half of Qalqilya's rich farmlands, with their orchards, apiaries, greenhouses and livestock, have lain outside Israel's barrier, which loops the town like a noose.
The stranglehold has taken its toll on Qalqilya's 43,000 residents, forcing job losses and business closures, dividing families and turning once brief journeys to work or schools into long and complex excursions.
Yesterday's Hague court ruling that the network of fences and walls carving up the occupied Palestinian territory is tantamount to annexation and should be dismantled may have vindicated the Palestinian position in the eyes of the world.
But few in Qalqilya expect it to make much difference to their daily lives in the face of Israel's assertion that the barrier is a vital security measure to protect its citizens against attacks by infiltrating Palestinian militants.
Mr Ibrahim Ahmed Zaid, who along with his four brothers owns the largest fresh egg company in the West Bank, is preparing for things in Qalqilya to get worse rather than better.
Three years ago, his family invested about €1.5 million to move their business from the town centre to a purpose-built hen farm on its northern fringe, which produces some 30,000 eggs daily.
Mr Zaid stands outside a yellow gate in the fence, the long rooftops of the battery visible some 300 metres away; it is still inside the occupied West Bank but is stranded on the Israeli side of the barrier.
Mr Zaid says this gate opened last August but was closed permanently three months later. His workers must make a less direct journey which can add hours to their travel time. Last week a truckload of 5,000 chickens destined for the farm was stuck at a crossing for four hours in the searing heat; 200 died, he said.
But this is nothing compared to last autumn, shortly after the barrier's completion, when Qalqilya was sealed off by the Israelis for several days. No workers could get to the farm to feed the poultry and 16,000 of the 60,000 stock perished, he said.
Like many locals with businesses or land beyond the fence, the Zaids' eight workers have started sleeping on the premises, even though the terms of their Israeli-issued "permits" to access the plant forbid this.
A genial man of 42 with a degree in sociology, Mr Zaid wipes his brow with a handkerchief and explains how the barrier has led to a 40 per cent increase in the business's costs and put paid to its expansion plans. Instead, the brothers have now opened a second small premises inside the barrier; a case of, literally, not placing all their eggs in one basket.
Asked about what hope he attaches to The Hague court ruling, Mr Zaid replied curtly that Israel was above the law. "America is supporting them. Sometimes we feel that our problem is not with Israel only. Bush [the US president] makes speeches which are often harsher than Sharon's [Israel's premier]."
The barrier encircles Qalqilya on three sides sealing it along its de-facto "border" with Israel on the west and blocks its direct routes to Palestinian villages to the north and south. The fence dips into the West Bank north and south of the town to take on to the Israeli side the illegal Jewish settlements of Zufin and Alfe Menashe.
Most of the barrier consists of a chain link fence fitted with electronic sensors and flanked with ditches, a patrol road, razor wire, a sand-covered "trace road" designed to capture foot prints, and a buffer zone.
For a 3 km section on Qalqilya's western fringe, the barrier turns into a looming sold mass of concrete 28 ft (8.5 metre) high, dotted with 13 sniper towers and red signs warning intruders of "mortal danger". This section runs along the trans-Israel highway and the army says it is designed to prevent Palestinians shooting at motorists travelling on the motorway, where a seven-year-old Israeli girl was killed last year.
The only gap in the almost complete encirclement of Qalqilya is on its eastern fringe inside the West Bank, where a former Israeli army checkpoint was recently removed.
The army says the dismantling of this checkpoint is among several significant measures undertaken to improve residents' lives and help traffic flow more freely between Qalqilya and adjacent West Bank villages.
Others include the removal of troops encircling the city, the dismantling of 10 roadblocks in the area and the ongoing construction of a tunnel linking Qalqilya with Habla to its south.
However, Qalqilya's mayor, Mr Ma'rouf Zaran, scoffs at the notion that the raft of restrictions on his townsfolk has been eased since the barrier went up.
Mr Zaran also dismisses claims that the barrier thwarts would-be bombers, pointing to the porous frontier which allows around 1,000 Qalqilya locals to slip into Israel for illegal work, as well as the town's still healthy joint Israeli-Palestinian "venture" - in stolen cars.
He catalogues a host of hardships: 32 per cent of the city's ground-well water supply is now on the Israeli side of the barrier; 540 of the town's 1,800 businesses have closed; 2,000 people have lost land.
But the damage goes beyond economics, he claims, noting an increase in thefts among increasingly impoverished residents as well as an upturn in the number of divorces which he attributes to finance-related stress.
He also says the barrier is the root cause of recent opinion poll findings showing a surge in support in the town for parties which advocate militant resistance, like Hamas and Islamic Jihad.