A Jerusalem municipal court convicted a group of 4 Arab men from East Jerusalem on Monday, after the men confessed to being involved in several firebomb attacks and an arson which set fire to a Jerusalem synagogue in November of 2013.
The group threw firebombs at Israeli cars and police cruisers on 8 different occasions, and the judge handed down relatively light sentences for crimes of this nature, ranging from 2-5.5 years. The District Court judge, Arie Romanov, refused the district prosecutor's request to hand down cumulative sentences, and the prosecutors' office is considering an appeal in reaction to the relatively light sentences.
The members of the group are Mohammad Abid, who was sentenced to 5.5 years in prison; Ibrahim Darbas (40 months in prison); Mohammad Alian (52 months in prison), and Waleed Alian (3 years in prison). All of the convicts are 20 years old, and reside in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Issawiya.
The group was active between the years 2013 - 2014, and according to the indictment, "inflicted terror on the residents of Jerusalem's French Hill neighborhood."
Among other acts, the group set fire to a synagogue in 2013, and were involved in several firebomb attacks against a fuel pump, police cruiser, and other targets.
One of the group's members was indicted independently due to his involvement in a 2014 firebomb attack on a Hebrew University parking lot.
Three other members of the group took part in a firebomb attack on the Ofrit military post a month later, and later attacked two passers-by who were heard speaking Hebrew near the Hebrew University.
The suspects admitted their participation in the acts within the framework of a plea agreement, but the sides did not manage to reach an agreement regarding sentencing.
Judge Romanov emphasized the severity of the group's actions, which were not limited to single incidents."The variety of incidents indicates sophistication," he said.
With that said, despite of the severity of the actions, Judge Romanov rejected the prosecutor's request to issue individual sentences for every incident.
"The prosecutors position holds arithmetic reasoning, and maybe more, but I fear this approach doesn't recognize mankind's limited life spans, the goal is to allow for rehabilitation and a return to society in order to open a new page after serving their punishment."
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Four children aged 10-11 were arrested on Sunday after throwing rocks at a civilian bus on Sultan Suleiman St. in Jerusalem. The boys, all residents of the A-Tur neighborhood of Jerusalem, had apparently just finished their school day and immediately hurried to the spot.
As rock and firebomb attacks increase and a legal showdown about their treatment drags on, rock attacks have become more and more typical: Jerusalem police have said that time and again they run into minors under the age of criminal responsibility (12) who throw rocks at Jews.
The law clearly doesn't allow for the filing of criminal charges against them, and as such, police typically search for their parents and release them into their custody.
Concurrently, rocks were thrown at border police on Sunday afternoon in A-Tur. The rock thrower, a 10-year-old Arab boy, was identified and captured. The police then searched for his parents and reported the incident to the relevant social services.
Photos: Palestinians with firebombs and rocks, The group of boys detained yesterday (and released) for hurling rocks at a bus
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