A Fast Track for Palestinian Merchants

Until last year, Nassar Herbawi’s arduous daily routine mirrored that of thousands of other Palestinians who do business in Israel. Herbawi, a mattress manufacturer, would rally his fleet of 15 trucks in Hebron and drive northwest for 10 miles to the Tarqumiya crossing, the busiest of the three freight transit points along the Green Line that divides Israel from the West Bank. On good days his trucks idled on a very long line waiting for guards to inspect their cargo of foam mattresses and sofa beds. Then the merchandise was loaded onto an Israeli truck for the final leg of the journey—a delivery at a department store in Tel Aviv.

On bad days, unexpected closures at the border caused such long delays that by the time Herbawi’s cargo got through to the Israeli side, the business day had ended, forcing drivers to return to Hebron without making their deliveries. The Palestinian businessman, who employs 500 workers, says that between 2007 and 2010 his once-thriving company operated at just 20 percent capacity.