Palestinian farmers harvest olives in an olive grove in Beit Awwa, west of Hebron, near the Israeli separation barrier on Oct. 15, 2026. (Photo by Wisam Hashlamoun\/Flash90)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Two weeks ago, Brad Lander, the Democratic nominee for New York\u2019s 10th Congressional District who was elected on Nov. 3, was detained by Israeli security forces along with other activists who staged a drama in a Palestinian olive grove in the Gush Etzion region, near Bethlehem in Area C, controlled according to the Oslo Accords by Israel. A day later, The Washington Free Beacon<\/i> revealed an internal document\u2014a script\u2014from trip organizers detailing their anti-Israel narrative, which accuses the Jewish state of \u201cethnic cleansing\u201d and \u201cgenocide.\u201d<\/p>\n
Other, similar incidents have occurred during this year\u2019s olive harvest. In each case, the visitors failed to<\/i> coordinate their visits with Israeli authorities, as required by law. Rather, their provocations of Israeli security forces were performed to fabricate a storyline in which Israel is ethnically cleansing Judea and Samaria of its Palestinian population.<\/p>\n
Not surprisingly, American legacy media have parroted this narrative, producing headlines such as The Washington Post\u2019s<\/i> \u201cIsraeli settlers attack Palestinians and Washington Post<\/i> photographer in West Bank\u201d and NBC\u2019s<\/i> \u201cNew York congressional candidate Brad Lander says IDF detained him in the occupied West Bank.\u201d<\/p>\n
The fact is, none of these theatrics would have taken place if those involved had coordinated their activities with Israeli authorities. No one would have been injured or detained; no show would have been staged.<\/p>\n
Furthermore, no<\/i> ethnic cleansing, let alone genocide, is occurring in Judea and Samaria, nor has it ever. Jews have long been the majority population in Area C, and no Palestinians are being moved out.<\/p>\n
Finally, the amount of \u201csettler violence\u201d in Judea and Samaria pales in comparison to much more frequent violence committed by Palestinians on law-abiding Jews.<\/p>\n
Truthfully, Western agitators who come to Judea and Samaria to provoke confrontations with Israelis aren\u2019t there to help Palestinians. They arrive to put on a performance\u2014often spending virtually no time \u201charvesting olives\u201d and hours arguing with and filming Israeli authorities. They are there exclusively to promote a false narrative on false pretenses; their goal is to discredit and demonize Israel.<\/p>\n
Lander didn\u2019t come to Judea and Samaria to pick olives<\/b><\/p>\n
He came to put on a show for legacy media. Indeed, a document obtained by The Washington Free Beacon<\/i> outlines Lander\u2019s real mission\u2014not harvesting olives, but \u201cshed[ing] a light on the reality of the occupation.\u201d<\/p>\n
The document contains instructions\u2014\u201ctalking points\u201d\u2014on what to tell reporters, with subheadings such as \u201cPalestinian communities in the West Bank are facing the imminent threat of ethnic cleansing\u201d and \u201cSettler violence is state policy.\u201d It also refers disingenuously to Israel\u2019s defensive campaign against Hamas in Gaza in response to the Oct. 7 massacre as a \u201cgenocidal assault.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lander described his detention by Israeli authorities as \u201cone more element of escalating, and very clearly state-sponsored ethnic cleansing.\u201d<\/p>\n
What exactly does his being detained have to do with ethnic cleansing? If Lander was truly interested in just harvesting olives, then he could have followed the law and coordinated his trip with Israeli authorities, which have facilitated some 100 olive harvests this season without any issues. But his real intention, and that of his fellow activists, was to provoke a confrontation with Israelis, allowing them to sell their fake narrative.<\/p>\n
Legacy media parrot the agitators\u2019 fabricated fiction<\/b><\/p>\n
Thus, reporters leave out crucial details about clashes between Western activists and journalists, against Israelis in Judea and Samaria. One incident occurred in which Heidi Levine, a photojournalist working for The Washington Post<\/i> was injured in a confrontation between Palestinians and Israeli citizens.<\/p>\n
The narrative told by mainstream media such as CNN and NPR<\/i> blamed the entire incident on violent Israeli \u201csettlers.\u201d What they failed to mention, however, was the presence of Palestinians armed with fireworks and foreign activists recording themselves provoking the Israelis. Such details would, of course, ruin their dramatized provocation.<\/p>\n
Israel has never attempted to ethnically cleanse Palestinians from Area C<\/b><\/p>\n
First, most Westerners don\u2019t realize that Area C is not, nor has ever been, \u201cPalestinian land.\u201d The Palestinians have never controlled it, let alone had sovereignty over it.<\/p>\n
Secondly, Jews are by far the majority population in Area C and have been since the 1990s, when the territory was defined under the Oslo Accords. As for the Palestinians, reliable estimates note that their population in Area C has actually increased and now stands at upwards of 300,000. There is no organized Israeli effort to remove legal Palestinian residents of Area C. Ethnic cleansing is an ultra-left and media fabrication.<\/p>\n
The United Nations reports more than 2,000 settler attacks in Judea and Samaria in the last 12 months. In fact, many of these \u201cattacks\u201d weren\u2019t violent at all, as the United Nations counts Jews peacefully visiting Jerusalem\u2019s Temple Mount or other religious sites in Judea and Samaria as \u201csettler violence.\u201d<\/p>\n
In contrast, Israel\u2019s Shin Bet security agency reports twice that amount of Palestinian violence, including stone-throwing, petrol bombs, shootings and stabbings. Yet legacy media coverage of \u201csettler violence\u201d\u2014almost all the misdeeds of a few hundred at-risk Israeli youth\u2014dwarfs coverage of Palestinian terrorism. An analysis of international coverage in early-to-mid 2026 reveals a journalistic travesty\u2014roughly 984 stories focused on \u201csettler violence\u201d vs. only nine on Palestinian attacks against Jews in Judea and Samaria\u2014an outrageous 109:1 ratio.<\/p>\n
Theatrics designed to malign Israel<\/b><\/p>\n
The performances put on by activists like Lander and House member Ro Khanna, who staged a similar farce back in July, are pure fiction\u2014performed to discredit and demonize the Jewish state while ignoring the real conflict, which is Palestinians and useful leftist idiots conjuring deceptive dramas in order to remove (ethnically cleanse) Israeli Jews from their indigenous homeland.<\/p>\n
The theatrics put on by people like Lander, Khanna and other leftist provocateurs don\u2019t deserve to be taken seriously.<\/p>\n
This article was originally <\/i>published<\/i><\/a><\/span> on Facts and Logic About the Middle East (FLAME)<\/i>.<\/p>\n
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