Court orders Palestinians' use of major Israeli highway

ISRAEL'S Supreme Court has ordered the military to let Palestinians travel on the part of a major highway that runs through the West Bank, handing them their biggest victory yet against Jewish state's practice of banning them from some roads, agency reports indicated.

The West Bank section of Route 443 linking Jerusalem and Tel Aviv was closed in 2002 to Palestinians, after militants shot at Israeli vehicles on the highway and killed several motorists, according to Associated Press (AP).

About half of the 20-mile (32-kilometre) highway runs through the West Bank, and Palestinian villages along the route can be easily seen behind chain fences, rows of boulders and other barriers.