In the spirt of this literature, the present paper exploits the first COVID-19 lockdown, imposed in Israel in mid-March 2020, to examine whether anxiety experienced during the lockdown period could have affected dishonest behavior. A survey conducted in Israel during the first lockdown pointed out to a sharp increase in anxiety rates as compared to 2018: almost one of four respondents (23%) reported experiencing a medium-high or a very high level of anxiety as compared to only one of ten respondents (12%) two years earlier (Kimhi et al, 2020). Leaning on Vincent et al (2013), we hypothesized that by blocking cognitive flexibility necessary to reframe and to rationalize dishonest acts anxiety negatively affect dishonesty, thereby engendering greater honesty. An experiment which combined self-reported anxiety with Fischbacher and Föllmi-Heusi (2013) die-under-the-cup task supported our hypothesis.