http://web.israelinsider.com/Articles/Politics/12723.htmIsraeli police admit they had no reason to round up Jewish protesters
By Israel Justice.com March 17, 2008
Israeli police have acknowledged that they grabbed demonstrators off the streets of Jerusalem for no reason.
Police told a Jerusalem court judge that many of the 22 protesters, most of them minors, were arrested in a March 16 protest without cause. The judge then released the youngsters, who had been accused by the police of resisting arrest.
"Everyone's crime was resisting arrest, but why were they arrested in the first place?" Jerusalem Magistrate Malka Aviv asked on March 17.
A police official said he did not know.
"Then, you're free to go," the judge said.
Police arrested 22 people in a demonstration outside the Jerusalem neighborhood of Jabal Mukhaber, where the Arab who killed eight Jewish seminary students had lived. Some of the protesters managed to slip past police cordons and throw stones at the homes of Arabs in the neighborhood after police prevented them from reaching the family home of the assailant, Ala Abu Dheim, who was killed in the March 6 shooting attack in the Mercaz Harav seminary in Jerusalem.
"They [the protesters] were standing there talking about the boys that were killed In Mercaz Harav when a policewoman laughed at them," I. K., mother of a 15 year-old boy who was arrested, said. "My son went over to her and right away they arrested him."
Some of the Jewish stone-throwers were arrested in Jabal Mukhaber. At that point, police commanders, under severe criticism for failing to stop the entry of the protesters into the Arab neighborhood, began to attack peaceful demonstrators in the adjacent Jewish neighborhood of Armon HaNatziv.
"They [the police] were lined up and all of a sudden they broke ranks and started pushing people," an American seminary student, D. K., recalled.
"I started running and then they grabbed me. They said I assaulted a police officer and resisted arrest."
In court, Ms. Aviv asked police why the seminary student had been arrested. The police representative said he did not know but wanted him to remain in detention for investigation.
"He wasn't caught throwing stones, so you can't hold him," the judge said. "You're free to go."
During the police charge, high school girls were attacked and pulled by their hair dragged on the ground, kicked and pushed into waiting police vans.
"They pulled her hair," said A. A. , whose daughter, a minor, was arrested. "Her entire body hurts because they dragged her on the ground and hit her."
In detention, several girls refused to identify themselves or respond to interrogators. They later identified themselves to the court and Ms. Aviv released them without any conditions, criticizing the police for failing to provide any evidence of offenses.
At least six protesters, arrested for throwing rocks, have been remanded for another two days
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