Democratic congressional candidate Brad Lander was detained by Israeli military forces Wednesday while participating in an olive harvest alongside Palestinian farmers and dozens of international activists in the West Bank.
Lander, the Democratic nominee for New York’s 10th Congressional District and former New York City comptroller, was among approximately 80 to 90 volunteers taken into custody near the Palestinian village of Nahalin, outside Bethlehem.
The group included American and Israeli rabbis, human rights activists and international volunteers who had gathered to assist local farmers with their olive harvest.
The confrontation began after Israeli troops arrived at an olive grove where participants had been working for approximately two hours.
Military personnel declared the area a closed military zone before detaining the volunteers and transporting them for questioning.
Lander confirmed his detention in a post on X, sharing a photograph from a bus carrying other participants.
“I’ve been detained by the IDF, along with a group of rabbis & volunteers,” Lander wrote.
“The occupation is a crime under international law. Harvesting olives isn’t a crime under any law I know.”
The Democratic candidate was released several hours later after receiving a warning from Israeli authorities.
However, some volunteers remained in custody when Lander announced his release.
He suggested that his political profile may have influenced the decision to let him go.
“I’ve been released from IDF custody with a ‘warning,’ apparently because of my public profile,” Lander wrote.
He added that he informed authorities he had not yet been elected to Congress and remained only a candidate.
Israeli military officials defended the detentions, arguing that participants had entered an area where agricultural activities required advance coordination with security authorities.
The Israel Defense Forces maintained that harvesting olives near an Israeli community without proper authorization could create security concerns.
Military officials also accused some volunteers of using the agricultural activity to provoke confrontations.
However, questions emerged concerning whether the location actually required advance approval.
The Times of Israel cited an official Israeli Civil Administration map indicating that the area where the volunteers were detained was not subject to the coordination requirements described by military officials, per Trending Politics.
The military subsequently maintained that the Palestinian landowner would need to coordinate future harvesting activities with authorities.
Rabbis for Human Rights, which helped organize the visit, disputed the military’s characterization of the event.
The organization said Palestinian farmers had been unable to access the affected olive groves for approximately three years.
Its representatives maintained that participants were engaged in peaceful agricultural work and had agreed to comply with military instructions.
Israeli police later confirmed that dozens of detainees had been released.
Four foreign activists, however, reportedly faced possible deportation proceedings following questioning about their political activities.
The incident comes as Lander prepares for the November 3 midterm elections, when he is seeking to represent a heavily Democratic congressional district in New York City.
Lander has been an outspoken critic of Israeli government policies in the West Bank and previously called for ending American military assistance to Israel.
His campaign has received backing from prominent progressive Democrats, including New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
Wednesday’s detention also follows a similar incident involving Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna of California, who was reportedly briefly detained by Israeli forces during a West Bank visit in July.
The latest confrontation has renewed attention on restrictions affecting Palestinian farmers and international volunteers participating in agricultural activities in the disputed territory.
Israeli authorities have defended such restrictions as necessary for security, while human rights organizations argue that they can prevent Palestinians from accessing privately owned agricultural land.
After his release, Lander continued criticizing the detentions and called on Israeli authorities to free the remaining volunteers.
Although the congressional candidate was released without any publicly announced criminal charges, the incident has introduced another international controversy into the closing weeks of his campaign.
The circumstances surrounding the detention of the remaining participants and any potential deportation proceedings have not been fully resolved.
