32 activists seeking to help with Palestinian olive harvest expelled from Israel, banned for 99 years over alleged ties to banned group

Thirty-two foreign activists seeking to help Palestinian olive growers with their olive harvest have been expelled from Israel and banned from entering the country for 99 years, following coordinated action by the Interior Ministry’s Population and Immigration Authority, the police in the West Bank, the National Security Ministry and the Samaria District Council.

According to a joint statement put out by some of those agencies today, the 32 activists “identified” with the Union of Agricultural Work Committees (UAWC) organization, which was banned by Israel in 2021 for its ties to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) terrorist organization.

The activists had sought to help olive growers in the Palestinian village of Burin in the northern West Bank, but when they arrived there last Thursday they were told by IDF forces that a closed military zone order had been issued that day banning the entry of anyone into the area who was not formally registered to take part in the harvest.

According to Samaria Regional Council chairman Yossi Dagan, the activists, whom the joint statement referred to as “anarchists,” staged an “illegal demonstration” close to Burin junction and a nearby farming outpost on land that was subject to the closed military order.

Dagan says residents of the unspecified farm contacted him, and he subsequently sent requests to IDF officers and cabinet ministers asking for the activists to be expelled from the country.

The joint statement says that during the subsequent investigation by the police it was discovered that the activists “were indeed identified” with UAWC, and they were therefore deported.

Lea Tsemel, a long time hard-left activist lawyer and member of the Balad party who provided legal counsel to the activists, says she was unaware of any protest that had taken place in the area.

Tsemel says the activists were detained for violating the closed military zone order, but had been entirely unaware that the order had been issued.

The activists were arrested, taken to the Ariel police station, and then according to Tsemel eventually to Givon Prison next to Ramle where they were held in what she said were “violent conditions,” until they were deported.

The activists were deported in stages over the course of the last week.

Justice Minister Yariv Levin, who is also interim interior minister, says that the operation “delivers a clear message that there will be zero tolerance for violating the sovereignty of the state, incitement to terrorism, and support for it,” although Burin and the West Bank are not sovereign Israeli territory.

A spokesman for Levin is unable to answer how the activists were able to enter Israel if they were associated with what Israel defines to be a terrorist organization.

Burin has suffered from repeated attacks by extremist Jewish settler activists from nearby illegal outposts such as Givat Ronen in recent years, including arson attacks against olive groves belonging to residents of the town, as well as theft of the olives and other efforts at undermining the town’s olive industry.