Peace Now activists arrested for interviewing MK under false pretenses

Three activists with the left-wing rights group Peace Now, at least one of them a professional actor, were arrested on Sunday at the Knesset after they posed as students and asked to interview right-wing MK Michael Ben-Ari (National Union).

The three were released from custody shortly after the arrest, but a complaint has been filed against them for impersonation and for trying to deceive an MK.

Peace Now confessed to planning the affair, saying that they wanted to portray MKs from the right in a ridiculous light.

The three activists had recently approached Ben-Ari, posing as students, and asked to interview him for their studies. Authorizations to enter the Knesset were prepared for them, at the request of Ben-Ari's aide.

During the interview, which took place Sunday at Ben-Ari's office, the subject became suspicious that the so-called students were imposters in light of the questions that they were asking him.

Ben-Ari asked security to detain the three, and they confessed during questioning that Peace Now had sent them.

Peace Now explained that they had wanted to make a "Borat-like" film to expose the embarrassing remarks of MKs from the right. The group's Secretary General Yariv Oppenheimer said that "we are producing a film about the right wing, which aims to expose the agendas of the MKs without the masks that they usually don."

Oppenheimer, who argued that the three did not break the law, added that "we tried to portray the right in a different, original way. We tried to get an authentic picture of the MKs."