Teens accused of beating Arab released

Three suspects of attack on woman in Jerusalem conditionally released by the Jerusalem Magistrate’s Court.

By BEN HARTMAN, MELANIE LIDMAN
Handcuffs arrest police crime illustrative 390 (photo credit: Marc Israel Sellem/The Jerusalem Post)
Handcuffs arrest police crime illustrative 390
(photo credit: Marc Israel Sellem/The Jerusalem Post)
Three Jewish teenagers involved in an altercation with an Arab woman at a light rail stop last week were conditionally released by the Jerusalem Magistrate’s Court on Monday.
A restraining order prohibits them from being in the capital for the next month.
Police arrested one 17-year-old girl on Sunday afternoon and the two other girls involved turned themselves into police overnight on Sunday.
Police opened an investigation after Israeli media published photos of three teenage Jewish girls beating an Arab woman at the light rail stop in Jerusalem’s Kiryat Moshe neighborhood on February 25.
No one filed a complaint with the police and there were no injuries.
Police examined security cameras at the light rail stop after a public outcry over the graphic photos, taken by leftwing activist and photographer Dorit Jordan Dotan, which show a group of girls yelling at and hitting an Arab woman wearing a headscarf.
Jerusalem police spokesman Shmuel Ben-Ruby said Sunday that it was impossible to determine who started the altercation as the cameras have no sound.
Late on Sunday night, the three girls involved in the incident filed a counter-complaint with police, claiming the Arab woman attacked them. Police said they will now question the Arab woman.