Brad Lander among 73 freed after West Bank olive-harvest detentions

Israeli police said on Wednesday that 73 volunteers detained while helping Palestinian farmers harvest olives near Nahalin, south of Bethlehem, had been released. They included Brad Lander, a Democratic candidate for the US House of Representatives, who said he had been freed with a warning. Four other foreign volunteers were to remain in custody overnight, police said.

Lander was released before many of the others. According to a police breakdown reported by The Times of Israel, 32 volunteers were questioned and released under orders not to return to the area, while 40 were freed without restrictions. Together with Lander, that accounts for the reported total of 73. The precise reach of the exclusion orders is unclear: another report by the same newspaper described them as barring people from the West Bank, not just the harvest area.

The volunteers were accompanying farmers on the occupied West Bank, where settler attacks have disrupted the olive harvest. Israeli forces said the group had failed to obtain advance approval for harvesting near a settlement, creating a security risk. But The Times of Israel reported that a map distributed by Israel’s Civil Administration did not mark the site as requiring prior coordination. The military responded that the site was missing from the map because Palestinians had not previously asked to harvest there. Whether advance approval was required at that location remains disputed.

Police said the four volunteers still held faced a hearing before Israel’s immigration authority on Thursday that could lead to deportation. Their release or deportation had not been established as of Wednesday evening.