Woman arrested for placing hostage flyers in shul says she was cuffed and taken away in front of her young kids

Idit Alexandrovich, one of three women detained after placing flyers calling for a hostage deal on seats in a Herzliya synagogue attended by Likud MK Yuli Edelstein, tells Channel 12 she found out about her imminent arrest from her young children who were home alone when police came to take her away.

“It’s insane. I have no other word… We’re in the State of Israel, the country of the Jewish people. I went with my friends to a synagogue, a place of prayer for Jews, where everyone can go, ” Alexandrovich says.

“We distributed flyers for the hostages, calling to ‘Let My People Go’. What could be more Jewish than that? The synagogue was open. We went in. We put the leaflets on the seats. We left, via the main entrance, there were people around, and we went home, happily hoping that maybe we’d done something that could help bring the hostages home.”

“And then, look at what Israel Police busies itself with. Yesterday, Friday afternoon, two police officers — a man and a woman — came to my home. I wasn’t home. I have four young kids. They called from the phone of my almost-nine-year-old and said the police are waiting at my home… waiting to arrest me.”

When she got home, she says, the officers told her she was “being arrested for breaking and entering and conspiracy to commit a crime… I was put in handcuffs. I was taken to the patrol car.” There, her feet were also cuffed, she says.

At the police station, she waited hours to be questioned, and then the police changed the allegations to trespassing, she says, “which is also false; the synagogue is open to everyone…”

And how could it possibly be a crime to distribute leaflets in a synagogue urging the release of the hostages? she asked.

“And for that, they arrested me, in front of my children?” Alexandrovich says. She adds the arrest was “plainly political,” and that she would not be intimidated.

“This is my country… I’m battling for the future of my children in this country.”