New York Democratic congressional candidate Brad Lander said he has been released after being detained Wednesday by the Israel Defense Forces while participating in an olive harvest in the occupied West Bank.

“I’ve been released from IDF custody with a ‘warning,’ apparently because of my public profile (I told them I wasn’t even a congressmember yet, just a nominee),” Lander wrote in a post on X Wednesday, after he said on the platform that he was among several rabbis and volunteers who were detained by the IDF. He said some in his group were still being detained.

The former New York City comptroller, who is Jewish and a political ally of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, had said he was traveling to the region with the “Protect the Harvest” coalition. The international organization mobilizes volunteers to the occupied West Bank to support Palestinians during their annual olive harvest — a bedrock of Palestinian life and culture.

“But several dozen rabbis & participants harvesting olives with me are still in detention,” Lander wrote. “For harvesting olives. They should all be released immediately.”

Lander, his campaign and the Israel Defense Forces did not immediately return MS NOW’s request for comment Wednesday.

The Israeli organization Rabbis for Human Rights, which described itself as “the only rabbinic organization in Israel explicitly dedicated to human rights in Israel and the Occupied Territories,” said Wednesday that Lander was detained for “for standing with Palestinians during the olive harvest.”

In a statement to Reuters, the group said Lander was part of a group of volunteers accompanying Palestinian harvesters in a village just outside Bethlehem when Israeli forces arrived and detained the group. The IDF and Israeli Police told the volunteers they were in a closed military zone, which Rabbis for Human Rights said they had no means of knowing.

The Israel Defense Forces said that it, along with authorities from the Judea and Samaria regions, detained a “number of” Palestinian harvesters and “dozens of people” accompanying them because they failed to submit an “an advance request to the relevant authorities before the start of the harvest season.”

“Coordinating the harvest is required in order to ensure the maintenance of security in the area and public order,” the IDF said in the statement.

In his post announcing his release, Lander said: “To be clear: Palestinians face far worse consequences every day. These detentions by the IDF are one more attempt to undermine Palestinians’ right to harvest their olive groves, travel on their roads, and live in their homes. Yet one more element of escalating, and very clearly state-sponsored ethnic cleansing.”

The incident comes as violence from Israeli settlers toward Palestinians in the occupied West Bank is on the rise ahead of Israel’s Oct. 27 elections.

Washington Post photojournalist Heidi Levine was injured last week while documenting an attack by a group of masked Israeli settlers on Palestinians who had gathered to harvest olives near the village of Abu Falah. The next day, settlers attacked European diplomats. The Israel police said last week they had arrested 10 people suspected of participating in the violent attacks.

Lander edged out incumbent Rep. Dan Goldman in the Democratic primary for New York’s deep blue 10th congressional district, which spans lower Manhattan and parts of Brooklyn. The two men sparred over their views on Israel during that race, with Lander focusing on his opposition to U.S. military aid for Israel.

Mamdani — who drew the ire of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after he called on the federal government to pursue his arrest — buoyed Lander’s campaign with an early endorsement.

Netanyahu is running for re-election next week in the country’s first election since the brutal Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack in Gaza and the Israel-Hamas war. He has compared Mamdani to the leaders of the Iran-backed terrorist organization Hezbollah on campaign billboards across Israel.

On Sunday, President Donald Trump endorsed Netanyahu for reelection. Trump praised the Israeli Prime Minister as a “great warrior prime minister” and bastion of peace.

The post New York Democratic candidate released by Israeli forces after being detained in West Bank appeared first on MS NOW.

New York Democratic congressional candidate Brad Lander said he had been released after being detained Wednesday by the Israeli army while participating in an olive harvest in the occupied West Bank.

“I’ve been released from IDF custody with a ‘warning,’ apparently because of my public profile (I told them I wasn’t even a congressmember yet, just a nominee),” Lander wrote Wednesday in a post on X, referring to the Israel Defense Forces, after he said on the platform that he was was among several rabbis and volunteers who were detained by the Israeli military. He said some in his group were still being detained.

The former New York City comptroller, who is Jewish and a political ally of New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, had said he was traveling to the region with the “Protect the Harvest” coalition. The international organization mobilizes volunteers to the occupied West Bank to support Palestinians during their annual olive harvest — a bedrock of Palestinian life and culture.

“But several dozen rabbis & participants harvesting olives with me are still in detention,” Lander wrote. “For harvesting olives. They should all be released immediately.”

Lander, his campaign and the Israeli army did not immediately return MS NOW’s requests for comment Wednesday.

The Israeli organization Rabbis for Human Rights, which describes itself as “the only rabbinic organization in Israel explicitly dedicated to human rights in Israel and the Occupied Territories,” said Wednesday that Lander was detained for “for standing with Palestinians during the olive harvest.”

In a statement to Reuters, the group said Lander was part of a group of volunteers accompanying Palestinian harvesters in a village just outside Bethlehem when Israeli forces arrived and detained the group. The military and the Israel Police told the volunteers they were in a closed military zone, which Rabbis for Human Rights said they had no means of knowing.

The military said that it, along with authorities from the Judea and Samaria regions, detained a “number of” Palestinian harvesters and “dozens of people” accompanying them because they failed to submit an “an advance request to the relevant authorities before the start of the harvest season.”

“Coordinating the harvest is required in order to ensure the maintenance of security in the area and public order,” the military said in the statement.

In a post announcing his release, Lander said: “To be clear: Palestinians face far worse consequences every day. These detentions by the IDF are one more attempt to undermine Palestinians’ right to harvest their olive groves, travel on their roads, and live in their homes. Yet one more element of escalating, and very clearly state-sponsored ethnic cleansing.”

The incident comes as violence from Israeli settlers toward Palestinians in the occupied West Bank is on the rise ahead of Israel’s Oct. 27 elections.

Washington Post photojournalist Heidi Levine was injured last week while documenting an attack by a group of masked Israeli settlers on Palestinians who had gathered to harvest olives near the village of Abu Falah. The next day, settlers attacked European diplomats. The Israel Police said last week that it had arrested 10 people suspected of participating in the violent attacks.

Lander edged out incumbent Rep. Dan Goldman in the Democratic primary for New York’s deep-blue 10th Congressional District, which spans lower Manhattan and parts of Brooklyn. The two men sparred over their views on Israel during that race, with Lander focusing on his opposition to U.S. military aid for Israel.

Mamdani — who drew the ire of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after he called on the federal government to pursue his arrest — buoyed Lander’s campaign with an early endorsement.

Netanyahu is running for re-election next week in the country’s first election since the brutal Hamas attack in Gaza on Oct. 7, 2023, and the Israel-Hamas war. He has compared Mamdani to the leaders of the Iran-backed terrorist organization Hezbollah on campaign billboards across Israel.

On Sunday, U.S. President Donald Trump endorsed Netanyahu for re-election. Trump praised the Israeli prime minister as a “great warrior prime minister” and bastion of peace.

The post New York Democratic candidate released after being detained in West Bank appeared first on MS NOW.

The Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency said Tuesday that a man whose arm was reportedly broken during an arrest in Long Beach, California, on Saturday had smashed a mirror on a government vehicle and that ICE did not hit him while he was on a bike.

Ricardo Gonzalez, a former Long Beach city employee, was found handcuffed, bleeding and being detained by several ICE officers when local authorities arrived at the scene at ICE’s request on Saturday, according to a statement from the Long Beach Police Department.

Rep. Robert Garcia, D-Calif., said Sunday that masked ICE agents had broken Gonzalez’s arm during a detention attempt and that Gonzalez is a U.S. citizen.

Videos of the encounter taken by bystanders appeared to show Gonzalez lying face down in a gutter while several ICE agents kneeled on his back. In several videos, Gonzalez is heard yelling repeatedly, “Help me, my arm is broken,” and “Call a paramedic.”

Gonzalez’s daughter, Leslie Gonzalez, said her father was “struck by an unmarked vehicle of federal agents while riding his E-Bike.” He was then tased twice and pinned to the ground, according to her description on a GoFundMe page created to help with her father’s medical expenses.

“ICE agents brutally attacked and broke the arm of a North Long Beach resident and U.S. citizen,” Garcia, whose district includes Long Beach and parts of Orange County, wrote in a statement Sunday posted to X. “The videos are horrific and should concern not just our community but the country.”

In its statement Tuesday, ICE said that it had targeted an undocumented person during an enforcement operation. It said “agitators” tried to stop the operation, “threaten officers and damage government vehicles.” It said that “ICE did NOT hit an individual on a bike” and that the agency is determining whether to charge the person with damage to a government vehicle.

Long Beach police said in a statement Monday to MS NOW that officers arrived after receiving a request for emergency assistance from the ICE officers due to “vehicle vandalism taking place and a subject in need of medical aid.”

According to police, officers saw “a large group disturbance involving the ICE agents” and a man in handcuffs who was bleeding.

“First responders from the Long Beach Fire Department took the man to a nearby fire station,” according to the statement. There, Gonzalez’s handcuffs were removed, and he was taken to a hospital.

The Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to MS NOW’s request for comment Monday.

Police officers cleared a crowd of protesters who had gathered near the scene Sunday.

Gonzalez is believed to have been one of several community members who called 911 when he “saw a circumstance escalating,” Long Beach Mayor Rex Richardson told CNN in a statement Sunday.

“When the police arrived, we know that he was detained. He was on a curb. He was injured,” Richardson said.

The incident drew outcry over the federal agency’s frequent use of force, which has often turned violent.

In a statement released on social media, Richardson said, “ICE doesn’t belong in our city and this activity undermines community safety and public trust.”

The situation involving Gonzalez is among the latest in a series of violent incidents and high-profile killings that have roiled the federal immigration agency. An ICE agent was placed on leave earlier this month after striking an undocumented immigrant with his vehicle in Houston.

California Attorney General Rob Bonta filed a lawsuit on Oct. 15 alleging ICE agents were unconstitutionally taking people into custody near state courthouses. New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani demanded ICE end its operations in the city after an agent shot and wounded a Dominican man earlier this month while trying to arrest him as his 5-year-old child sat in the backseat.

Scores of high-profile national Democrats have demanded that the immigration agency be abolished in the wake of the deadly shootings of two U.S. citizens, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, by federal immigration agents in Minneapolis earlier this year.

“I’m proud of the neighbors who documented and stood up for the family being terrorized by ICE,” Garcia wrote in his statement Sunday. “Donald Trump and his inhumane and illegal deportation machine must be stopped. Long Beach stands with our community and our immigrant families. ICE is not welcome in Long Beach. Abolish ICE.”

The post ICE says man whose arm was broken in California arrest damaged a government vehicle appeared first on MS NOW.

Settlers in the occupied West Bank attacked Palestinian villagers, set fire to the olive trees they were harvesting and beat an American journalist Friday in the latest instance of rising settler violence in the region.

Heidi Levine, a veteran photojournalist for The Washington Post, said she was wearing a vest that clearly read “PRESS” on the front and back when a group of settlers, dressed in black with their faces covered, pushed her to the ground and kicked her at least 50 times as she tried to document what witnesses described as a “coordinated attack.”

Levine was taken to a hospital in the Ramallah region, where she is in stable condition.

“I was attacked, pushed to the ground,” Levine told reporters from her hospital bed Friday. “Luckily I had my flak jacket and helmet. Otherwise I probably wouldn’t even be here because they just kept kicking me and kicking me.”

Witnesses who spoke to The Associated Press and Reuters said the attack began when a group of 80 or more settlers descended from a hill above an olive grove in which Palestinian villagers from Abu Falah had gathered to harvest, an annual tradition that has long been a cornerstone of Palestinian culture.

The settlers set the groves on fire and hurled rocks at the Palestinian villagers, according to the witness accounts. Levine was part of a group of journalists who were about 80 yards away when settlers chased them down and overtook them.

She was beaten with sticks and kicked until a group of Palestinians pushed the settlers back enough for American journalist Jasper Nathaniel to reach Levine and help her to safety, according to The Washington Post.

“To be clear, the only reason I was able to reach Heidi was because young Palestinians provided cover with rocks against machine-gun- and tear-gas-wielding settlers and soldiers,” Nathaniel said in a post on X, which included video footage of a group rushing to help Levine. “It’s those kids, not the settler terrorists, who the IDF was hunting after the attack.”

In a subsequent post, Nathaniel shared a photo of a bandaged Levine lying in a hospital bed.

“Heidi is going to be okay, but her injuries are significantly worse than initially thought,” Nathaniel wrote in the post. “It appears that she may have been stabbed. She’s getting ready for surgery.”

The Washington Post did not immediately respond to MS NOW’s request for comment on Friday. Executive Editor Matt Murray in a statement shared with the Post condemned the incident as an unwarranted attack on a member of the free press.

“This morning, a Washington Post photographer, Heidi Levine, was attacked by Israeli settlers while reporting in the West Bank,” Murray said. “She was wearing visible markings clearly identifying her as a journalist. While we are relieved that Heidi has received medical care and is safe, we are outraged by this unwarranted attack on a journalist doing her job and urge a thorough investigation and follow-through from authorities.”

Witnesses said that when soldiers with the Israeli military arrived at the scene, they fired tear gas at Palestinians who had dodged the jeeps that the soldiers had driven through the attack.

The Israeli military said in a statement Friday that “the forces acted to disperse the confrontation using riot dispersal means.”

“IDF soldiers initially fired warning shots into the air and then fired toward a suspect who ran toward them, carrying a sharp object and posed a threat to them,” the statement said, adding the incident is under investigation.

The office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whose far-right government has facilitated a significant expansion of Israeli settlements and outposts across the West Bank, said the circumstances of Levine’s attack “remain unclear and are under investigation.”

Israel “unequivocally condemns violence against anyone,” the statement said. “But serious questions remain.”

It added: “Reports indicate some 200 Arabs and far-left activists confronted approximately 40 Israeli youths. Footage shows masked individuals on both sides hurling objects, amid reports of fireworks fired at Jewish youths. Other footage appears to show Levine knocked down and immediately helped to her feet by the same unidentified individual.”

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Alaska Republican incumbent Sen. Dan Sullivan failed an attempt at a “gotcha” moment against former Democratic Rep. Mary Peltola as they clashed Thursday in their final debate ahead of November’s midterm elections.

The pair, who are competing in a key U.S. Senate race that could determine which party controls the upper chamber, traded quips over the impact of President Donald Trump’s policies on Alaska’s economy and their plans to deliver for the state if elected.

In one testy exchange, Sullivan, a close ally of Trump who is running for a third term with the president’s endorsement, made a blunder when he accused Peltola of having received the questions in advance of the debate.

“Can I ask the moderator a question?” Sullivan said shortly after Peltola said Alaskans are suffering higher gas prices due to the ongoing closure of the Strait of Hormuz. “We weren’t supposed to get these questions beforehand, were we?”

“Neither one of you got questions beforehand,” said Lori Townsend, the chief editor at Alaska Public Media, who moderated the debate. “Absolutely not.”

“Okay, I’m just watching my opponent read from questions that seem to be answered,” Sullivan said.

“I’m prepared,” Peltola responded.

Sullivan was apparently accusing Peltola of violating the debate rules by receiving questions from the panel beforehand. But the exchange instead appeared to be a failed attempt at a “gotcha” moment by the Republican, which highlighted Peltola’s calm demeanor as she delivered her answers.

The incident recalls Sen. Eric Schmitt’s similarly embarrassing misfire in Jack Smith’s hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee last month. The Missouri Republican accused the former special counsel of perjuring himself about an NBA basketball game in Atlanta that he did not attend. Smith was at the University of Maryland in College Park that night, watching Maryland play the University of Iowa.

Overall, Peltola and Sullivan have spent more than $56 million on ads in the race, which have dominated Alaska’s limited airwaves for months. The general election contest is also likely to shatter spending records.

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In a debate Tuesday in Atlanta, Sen. Jon Ossoff made more headlines for what he said he would not do in 2028 than for his 2026 re-election campaign.

Such has long been the case for the Georgia Democrat, who is competing against Republican Rep. Mike Collins for a second U.S. Senate term. No sooner had the pair shaken hands before their second debate than Ossoff was asked the question that has consistently stoked speculation.

“Senator Ossoff, you’ve repeatedly said you won’t run for president in 2028, but your name continues to surface as a potential contender,” Greg Bluestein, chief political reporter for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and a debate moderator, said. “So will you pledge right now tonight to serve your full, six-year term if you win?”

Ossoff was quick to deliver an unequivocal response: “I have zero interest in running for president.”

That line is one Ossoff has used many times before. Across multiple interviews and public appearances, he has routinely rejected the speculation that he is interested in mounting a bid for the White House in 2028.

“I’m not running for president,” Ossoff clarified Tuesday. “I’m running for re-election to the Senate.”

But Ossoff’s repeated rebukes have done little to quell the speculation, and it is far from unheard of for a candidate campaigning for re-election to hint that they would abandon another term to run for president. If Ossoff beats Collins in November — and polling widely indicates that is likely — he would be only two years into his second term when 2028 rolls around.

The freshman Senator is widely regarded in Democratic circles as a rising star. His sharp, methodical interrogations of witnesses at congressional hearings often go viral on social media.

During Director of National Intelligence Jay Clayton’s confirmation hearing in July, Ossoff pressed Clayton over his refusal to answer questions about who won the 2020 election and his stumble during a series of questions about whether he knew Trump had told former DNI chief Tulsi Gabbard to attend an FBI raid of the Fulton County, Georgia, election office earlier this year.

“The first time you learned that Director Gabbard was present at that raid was in my office yesterday?” Ossoff asked Clayton, referring to a private conversation the men had the day before. The senator appeared stunned.

“It was the first time that, in my recollection, I’ve thought about it recently,” Clayton answered.

Ossoff’s line of questioning dominated headlines after the hearing, and Clayton’s answer deepened Democrats’ concern that Trump is launching an unprecedented effort to discredit and potentially steal the midterm elections. Clayton was confirmed 51-47 along party lines in July.

In a previous hearing, Ossoff grilled Gabbard herself over why she was at the search of the Georgia elections office. He has also pressed Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth about inconsistencies in the White House’s narrative about the Iran war and peppered Louis DeJoy, the former U.S. postmaster general, about widespread mail delays in Georgia, asking him if he had received a letter Ossoff had sent him.

In an interview with MS NOW in August, Ossoff said he has “zero interest” in a presidential run and that his purpose in those interrogations was “not to gain attention.” Instead, he said, it was “to do my job and do it well,” saying that his work in the Senate has led to tangible, legislative impact in his home state of Georgia.

On the campaign trail in 2004, then-Senate hopeful Barack Obama rejected the idea that he would make a bid for the White House. In 2008, three years into his Senate term, he was elected president of the United States.

Kevin Frey contributed to this report.

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