Woman who plowed car through Jewish building was in drug-induced ‘episode,’ doesn’t remember attack

The Indianapolis woman accused of plowing her car into what she thought was a Jewish school was experiencing a drug-induced “episode” and doesn’t remember carrying out the antisemitic attack, her lawyer claims.

Ruba Almaghtheh, 34, was under the influence of several medications when she allegedly backed her vehicle into a building associated with Black Hebrew Israelites late Friday while shouting “Free Palestine,” her attorney, Gary Colasessano, told The Associated Press.

The lawyer claimed that Almaghtheh, a Muslim originally from Jordan, has been taking various drugs for physical disabilities and the mental stress of a pending divorce while caring for her three children.

But Almaghtheh allegedly admitted she was inspired to crash into the Israelite School of Universal and Practical Knowledge in protest of Israel’s relentless counterattack in Gaza that has left more than 10,000 Palestinians dead.

The “Hebrew Israelite” school has a symbol resembling a Star of David on its facade.

She told officers at the scene that she had been watching TV coverage of the war in the Middle East “and decided to plan an attack by crashing into the building on purpose because she observed a symbol located on the residence that she took high offense to and related it to being an Israeli school,” according to an arrest affidavit.

“Yes. I did it on purpose,” Almaghtheh allegedly said in the wake of her arrest.

She repeatedly described the building as the “Israel school.” Cops also said the driver referred to “her people back in Palestine.”

Witnesses told investigators she made similar comments to them after they watched her deliberately put her car in reverse and back into the building, causing an estimated $10,000 worth of damages, the documents state.

The Israelite School of Universal and Practical Knowledge is a sect of the Black Hebrew Israelites, according to the Anti-Defamation League.

It is also listed by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a “Radical Hebrew Israelites” group and is considered by the law center as a “hate group” whose ideology has grown increasingly antisemitic, anti-white, anti-LGBTQ, xenophobic and misogynistic since the 1960s.

Almaghtheh, who police dubbed a “terrorist,” has no prior criminal record and targeted the building only after becoming overwhelmed by “the constant barrage of news about the war in Gaza,” her attorney said.

Just one week earlier, she filed for divorce against her husband who allegedly left her and moved to Africa, court records show.

Colasessano claims his client is also under a doctor’s care for several physical ailments that cause her physical pain.

Almaghtheh was ordered by a judge during her initial court hearing Wednesday to stay away from synagogues and other Jewish religious and cultural centers.

She faces charges of intimidation, criminal recklessness and institutional criminal mischief, all felonies, all of which she pleaded not guilty to.

Her bond was set at $200,000, an unusually high amount prosecutors pushed for in a motion claiming Almaghtheh “intentionally crashed her vehicle into a building that she believed was home to a religious or cultural center that supports Israel.”

“The allegations in the probable cause affidavit are extremely disturbing. We cannot and will not tolerate hate in our community,” Marion County Prosecutor Ryan Mears said Wednesday in a statement.

With Post Wires