Brad Lander released after detention with West Bank olive-harvest volunteers

Democratic congressional nominee Brad Lander says he has been released from Israeli custody with a warning after being detained with dozens of volunteers helping Palestinian farmers harvest olives in the West Bank on Wednesday.

Lander — a former New York City comptroller, an ally of NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani, and the Democratic nominee for New York’s 10th district in the November 3 midterms — was among roughly 80 to 90 volunteers detained near Nahalin, outside Bethlehem, according to Rabbis for Human Rights. Al Jazeera, citing the group, reported about 80; Reuters, citing the same group, reported 90.

The American, Israeli, Palestinian, British and Canadian volunteers, including rabbis from T’ruah, had been helping Palestinian farmers for about two hours when Israeli forces declared a closed military zone. The rights group says it could not have known in advance, and that its leaders offered to leave voluntarily.

“I’ve been released from IDF custody with a ‘warning,’ apparently because of my public profile,” Lander wrote on X. “I told them I wasn’t even a congressmember yet, just a nominee.”

RHR acting director Anton Goodman told Reuters that Lander had been released but everyone else was held at a police station in an Israeli settlement, with non-Israeli and non-Palestinian detainees expected to be taken to a military base.

Two Israeli lawyers told NPR it was the largest mass detention of activists in the West Bank in at least a decade; campaigner Rabbi Arik Ascherman called it “unprecedented”. The Israeli military said in a statement to NPR that harvesting in the area requires farmers to submit requests before the olive harvest season to coordinate security, and that no request was submitted in this case. “Regarding reports of the detention of a congressional candidate, we note that he was released once the matter was brought to our attention,” it said. The US Embassy did not immediately comment.