This afternoon, some 180 arrestees were released, including close to 50 minors. Yesterday, 60 others were freed. All of them were arrested after they barricaded themselves last Thursday atop the synagogue in Kfar Darom, and forcefully resisted being taken down. The clash involved the throwing of sand, paint and other objects - including an unidentified substance that the police say was caustic acid. The doctor who treated those who were hit with the substance says differently.
Only Rabbi Yaakov Savir of Elon Moreh remains in prison.
The Prosecution asked the judge in the Be'er Sheva Magistrates Court to require the youths' parents to sign as guarantors for their children. The judge refused: "You did not allow the arrestees to phone their parents, and some of the parents don't even know where their children are - and now you want them to come here?" He ruled that the parents could come to any police station in Israel by this coming Sunday evening to sign for their children.
Present in the courtroom were MK Gila Finkelstein (NRP), who was also there yesterday helping secure the release of many of the minors, and Rabbi Zalman Melamed, head of Yeshivat Beit El. Some 40 students of his yeshiva were among those arrested.
MK Uri Ariel (National Union) was also involved in the efforts to free the Kfar Darom resistors. He said today, "I am happy that finally, sanity has come to the fore. The arrest of the minors was unnecessary; it's obvious that the vast majority of them were not involved in any attack, and keeping them in custody after their uprooting was a crime upon a crime."