The request is being submitted by attorney Nitzana Darshan-Leitner, Director of the “Shurat Hadin” organization on behalf of more than 120 Israeli citizens who make daily use of this road and/or reside in the area. The request is based on the claim that reopening Road 443 to Palestinian vehicular traffic will increase the number of attempted terrorist attacks along this road, and will endanger the security and the lives of Israeli citizens, Jews and Arabs alike, who make use of the road.

The request was submitted in response to the petition of the Association for Citizen’s Rights which was submitted in the names of six village leaders located along Road 443: Beit Sirah, Beit Liki, Hirbet al-Mashebach, Beit Ur al-Tahta, Beit Ur Al – Fuka and Tzafa. The petition charged that blocking access to Palestinian traffic on Road 443, is not derived from security motives, and prohibiting traffic constitutes racial discrimination, and infringes upon basic rights of the Palestinian residents, as well as the fact that it was done without legal authority.

The Shurat Hadin organization claims that Road 443 constitutes the only alternative highway to Road No. 1 (the Jerusalem-Tel Aviv highway) and a primary traffic artery between the cities of Jerusalem and Tel-Aviv and the settlements and cities in the area including Modiin, Bet Horon, Macabim, and others. For some of the Israeli settlements situated along its length, Road 443 is the only traffic artery connecting them.

The road, which for many years has served the residents of Judea and Samaria and the local Arab villages without any limitations, was closed to Arab vehicular traffic by security forces in the year 2000, after the outbreak of the Intifada, when a series of attacks drew a significant toll in lives. These attacks were perpetrated from Palestinian vehicles traveling on the road, and the terrorists subsequently escaped the area via the access roads to the local villages situated nearby.

In the request, it was claimed that some of the terrorist attacks were perpetrated directly by residents of the Arab villages adjacent to the route of the road, including the villages of the petitioners themselves. For example, Yaniv and Sharon Ben-Shalom ob”m were murdered in August 2001 in a drive-by shooting from a vehicle traveling on Road 443 while driving with their small children in their car.

These terrorist attacks, coupled with multiple incidents of stone-throwing and molotov cocktails thrown in the direction of Israeli traffic on the road, caused the defense forces to employ a series of measures whose intentions were purely security-oriented, so as to guarantee the safety of those making use of the road. The IDF closed the road to Palestinian vehicular traffic, while reinforcing both IDF and Border Patrol forces in the area and constructing concrete partitions alongside sections of the road, among other things, thus significantly reducing the attempted attacks upon the Israeli vehicles traveling the road.

In the words of Atty. Darshan-Leitner: “There is no need for additional murder victims in order to learn our lesson. The opening of the road to Palestinian traffic will once again place those who make use of the road in mortal danger. With all due respect to the rights of the Palestinians to convenience, the rights of Israeli citizens to life should take precedence.