A court in Krakow has ended pretrial custody for two ultra-Orthodox Israeli women, aged 23 and 24, who spent three and a half months locked up after border officers found khat in their bags. The plant is treated as a banned drug in Poland and across the European Union.
They were stopped on 19 June after a flight from Israel. Investigators say each suitcase held 50 kilograms, for a combined load of 100 kilograms. Their Polish lawyer, Wit Steidler, told the court the quantity was huge under Polish rules and that a conviction could bring a sentence of three to 23 years. He argued that further isolation was unnecessary.
The judge accepted a package of bail plus weekly reporting to police. Both women must stay in Poland until the case ends. Steidler said he had not expected release. He described the pair as young and said this was their first act of this kind, and that he had asked for supervised freedom rather than continued custody.
Couriers are often drawn from Israel's ultra-Orthodox community, the report says, with recruiters offering a plane ticket and 5,000 shekels and claiming that the worst outcome is a modest fine or loss of the bags. Demand for the leaves is strong among Ethiopian and Eritrean communities in Europe. Poland is among the toughest jurisdictions: once bags of roughly 40 to 80 kilograms are found, suspects commonly spend weeks or months in custody before trial. For people with no record, that can mean harsh conditions, distance from relatives, little access to kosher meals, and a language barrier. Detention is also used as an early shock, ahead of any verdict.
Israeli lawyer Mordechai Tzivin, who helps citizens in trouble overseas and worked without charge for one of the women beside Steidler, credited Polish officers with humane handling and said the court had room to weigh mitigating facts.