Three Israeli teens jailed for assaulting Palestinians

JERUSALEM (AFP) --  Three Israeli teenagers convicted of taking part in a brutal assault on a group of Palestinian youngsters in Jerusalem last August have been given jail terms, a copy of Sunday's district court judgement showed.

Jamal Julani, 17, and three cousins, residents of Israeli-annexed Arab east Jerusalem, were attacked by dozens of Israeli youths in Zion Square, a busy bar and entertainment district of west Jerusalem.

Julani was rushed unconscious to hospital but eventually released in good condition. Eight suspects -- seven of them minors -- were arrested at the time.

The Jerusalem district court on Sunday sentenced three of them whose ages at the time were around 16 to one, three and eight months prison time, based on the nature of their involvement in the crime, a protocol of the ruling said.

The trio cannot be named because they are minors.

The perpetrators "found innocent victims, whose only crime was that they were young Arabs, and the mob beat one of them a step away from death," Justice Jacob Zaban wrote in his decision.

"The rioters decided that Julani was not a human but an object to which they could do as they wish, hence the great severity of the entire event."

The assault shocked the Israeli establishment, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Shimon Peres condemning the attack and then parliament speaker Reuven Rivlin apologising to Julani in hospital.