The Israeli task force deporting foreign activists from the West Bank
An Israeli soldier stops and questions international activists in the West Bank village of At-Tuwani, 20 October 2024
Oren Ziv reports in +972 on 31 October 2024:
Israel has intensified its efforts to disrupt the work of international solidarity activists in the occupied West Bank in recent weeks, especially those supporting Palestinians during the olive harvest. Since the start of October, eight foreign activists have been detained; five of them were subsequently either deported or pressured to leave the country, while the other three were banned from the West Bank for varying lengths of time.
The detentions represent an escalation in Israel’s restrictions on international access to the occupied territory, a policy now facilitated by a special “task force” created in April by National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir. Specifically targeting foreign activists in the West Bank, it operates under Israel’s Shai (West Bank) Central Police Unit and coordinates with the Population and Immigration Authority to expedite detentions and deportations.
The task force was set up shortly after the Biden administration and other foreign governments began imposing sanctions on violent Israeli settlers and settler organizations, and appears to be a direct response to it. According to data from the Human Rights Defenders Fund, 15 foreign human rights activists have been detained and then deported or coerced into leaving the country under the task force’s authority.
Israeli soldiers disperse Palestinian farmers and activists, preventing them from picking olives during the annual harvest season, in the West Bank village of Qusra, 29 October 2024
+972 spoke with some of these activists, who recounted threats, intimidation, and false accusations during interrogations by Israeli security officers. Several say they were accused of being “terrorists,” “Israel haters,” “Hamas supporters,” and of intending to “attack Jews and soldiers.” In some cases, police presented them with photographs revealing that they closely monitor activists both on the ground and through their social media, looking for all possible grounds to detain and deport them.
A lawyer representing some of the activists told +972 that there was insufficient evidence for the police to extend the activists’ detention or to file indictments against them within the framework of criminal proceedings. That is why they were quickly transferred to the Population and Immigration Authority, an arm of the Interior Ministry, where the threshold for visa denial or deportation is lower.