The West Bank barrier

What happened

Israeli governments had been studying ways to block infiltration from the central and northern West Bank since 1996, and the cabinet approved a plan of that kind for the first time in July 2001. ² Nothing was built until the suicide bombing campaign of the Second Intifada forced the issue. Between October 2000 and July 2003, 35 successful suicide attacks came out of the northern West Bank alone: 21 traced to Jenin, which killed 97 Israelis, and 14 traced to Nablus, which killed 59. ⁶

The decisions came in stages. On April 14, 2002, the cabinet approved 80 kilometers of works in three areas of the West Bank. ² On June 23, 2002, it approved the first phase of a continuous fence, and that August it fixed the line for Phase A, 123 kilometers running from the Salem checkpoint north of Jenin down to the settlement at Elkana. ² On October 1, 2003, the cabinet approved a full route that the UN Secretary-General's report described as one continuous line of 720 kilometers. ²

The wall-or-fence argument is mostly a vocabulary problem. Roughly 90% of the structure is chain-link fence with ditches, barbed wire, patrol roads and observation systems; about 10% is concrete. ⁵ When the Secretary-General reported to the court, about 180 kilometers were finished or under construction, of which some 8.5 kilometers were concrete wall, put up generally where Palestinian population centers sit close to Israel, near Qalqiliya and Tulkarm and in parts of Jerusalem. ² The fence version is wider than the wall version, a complex of 50 to 70 meters and up to 100 meters in places. ²

The route is the actual fight. By the Secretary-General's account, the northernmost stretch barely departs from the Green Line, but the works lie inside occupied territory for most of their course, deviating more than 7.5 kilometers in places to put settlements on the Israeli side, and the planned route ran as much as 22 kilometers east. ² On that route, about 975 square kilometers, or 16.6% of the West Bank, would fall between the Green Line and the barrier, an area home to 237,000 Palestinians, with another 160,000 living in almost completely encircled communities. ² In October 2003 the IDF declared that strip a Closed Area: residents needed permits to stay, non-residents needed permits to enter, and Israeli citizens and anyone eligible under the Law of Return were exempt. ²

The route and the permit regime together are what the barrier was judged on. On July 9, 2004, the International Court of Justice issued an advisory opinion holding that the barrier and its associated regime were contrary to international law, by 14 votes to 1. ^{1 2} By the same margin it held Israel obligated to stop building, dismantle what stood in occupied territory, and make reparation; by 13 to 2 it held that all states must not recognize the situation the barrier created. ² The court rejected Israel's argument from Article 51 of the UN Charter on narrow grounds: Article 51 covers armed attack by one state against another, Israel did not claim the attacks were attributable to a foreign state, and Israel itself said the threat came from territory it controls. ² It also rejected the necessity defense, saying it was not convinced the barrier along that route was the only available means. ² The same opinion said plainly that Israel faces "numerous indiscriminate and deadly acts of violence against its civilian population" and has the right and the duty to respond. ² Judge Thomas Buergenthal was the lone vote against on the illegality finding itself, and against every operative paragraph but one; on the non-recognition paragraph, Judge Kooijmans joined him. ²

Israel's own Supreme Court had already taken a different approach to the same problem. In Beit Sourik, decided in 2004, a panel under President Aharon Barak accepted that the military commander could build a fence for security but voided roughly 30 of the 40 kilometers at issue, applying a three-part proportionality test: rational connection, least injurious means, and benefit proportionate to harm. ³ The court quoted the government's own decision that the fence "does not mark a national border or any other border." ³ In September 2005, in the Alfei Menashe case, the court took up the ICJ opinion directly, declined to treat it as binding, said it would judge the barrier segment by segment rather than as a whole, and ordered the route around Alfei Menashe reconsidered. ⁴

Why it still matters

Twenty-four years on, the barrier is still unfinished and still not a border. As of April 2026, the planned route runs 712 kilometers, 64% of it is built, and 85% of it runs inside the West Bank rather than along the Green Line. ⁷ Thirteen checkpoints sit along it, of which three admit West Bank ID holders with permits into East Jerusalem and Israel, and about 62 agricultural gates control access to farmland on the far side, only 74% of which opened during the 2025 olive harvest. ⁷ More than 14,000 Palestinians with West Bank IDs live between the barrier and the Green Line. ⁷ Most permits have been revoked or suspended since October 7, 2023. ⁷

The Israeli security case is strong and worth stating at full strength. After the first phase went up, successful suicide attacks originating in the northern West Bank fell from 35 over roughly three years to three. ⁶ Our view: that is the strongest fact in the file, and any argument about the barrier that skips it is not an honest argument.

The Palestinian and international case is also worth stating at full strength. A barrier following the Green Line would raise almost none of these questions, and this one does not follow the Green Line. It takes in 16.6% of the West Bank, requires 237,000 people to carry permits to live where they live, and exempts Israelis from the regime it imposes on them. ² That asymmetry is what the ICJ ruled on, and it is why Israel's own court kept striking down segments while upholding the concept. ^{3 4}

There is also the practical objection, which is that the thing has holes. In July 2022, after attacks in Tel Aviv, Bnei Brak and Elad by Palestinians who crossed through breaches, the IDF put 60 engineering vehicles and three battalions on the line under Brig. Gen. Ido Mizrahi and started a 20-kilometer trench in the Judean Desert. ⁸ Thousands of Palestinians had been crossing through gaps daily to get to work. ⁸ The barrier had cost about 9 billion shekels by then. ⁸

The wording of the Israeli cabinet's own decision still gets quoted. It said the fence does not mark a national border, or any other border. ³ The route it authorized would leave nearly 320,000 Israeli settlers, 178,000 of them in East Jerusalem, on the Israeli side of it. ²

The words you'll hear

Separation barrier. The neutral term for the structure. Israeli usage favors "security fence," which fits the roughly 90% that is chain-link; critics favor "wall," which fits the roughly 10% that is concrete. ⁵

The seam zone. The strip between the barrier and the Green Line, declared a Closed Area by IDF order in October 2003, where Palestinian residents need permits to remain and Israelis and those eligible under the Law of Return do not. ²

Advisory opinion. A non-binding legal answer the ICJ gives to a UN organ that asks for one, as opposed to a judgment between two states that agreed to be sued. The July 2004 opinion on the barrier is one of these. ¹

Proportionality. In Israeli Supreme Court practice on the barrier, a three-part test: does the route rationally serve security, is it the least injurious option available, and is the harm proportionate to the benefit. Beit Sourik voided about 30 kilometers of planned route under it. ³

Agricultural gates. The roughly 62 openings in the barrier that let Palestinian farmers reach land cut off on the Israeli side, on schedules set by the army. ⁷