Israeli forces close the last open entrance to al-Mughayyir
The village northeast of Ramallah lost its eastern entrance in October 2023 and has been reachable only from the west since. On Sunday that way in was shut too, and tear gas was fired at vehicles that came near it.
Israeli forces shut the western entrance to al-Mughayyir, a village northeast of Ramallah in the occupied West Bank, on Sunday, and stopped residents from travelling in or out of it, local media reported.
Tear gas canisters were fired at vehicles that came towards the closed entrance, the same report said. A number of people making the journey were held at the spot, questioned there and treated roughly.
That western approach had been the village's only way in. The entrance on its eastern side was closed by Israeli forces in October 2023 and has stayed closed since, leaving the village dependent on one road — and, for as long as Sunday's closure held, on none at all.
A closure at the entrance is not the same as a raid inside a village, and it is easy to record as the lesser of the two. Its effect is measured in what does not move: a shift outside the village that is not worked, an appointment at a hospital in Ramallah that is not kept, a delivery that does not arrive. Nothing about it is visible afterwards, and nothing about it is recorded unless someone counts the day.
No reason was given for the closure, and there was no indication of how long it was meant to last.