Palestinian children convicted of attempted murder 'without evidence'

Two Palestinian children were sentenced to two years in jail on Wednesday for attempted murder and carrying knives.

The families of Shadi Anwar Farah, 13, and Ahmad Raed Zaatari, 13, said the two boys had been beaten and interrogated illegally, without an adult present, in Jerusalem's infamous al-Maskoubia interrogation centre.

According to independent witnesses at the trial, there was no evidence that the two boys had attempted any kind of violence.

Farah and Zaatari were arrested in an Israeli neighbourhood of East Jerusalem on 12 December 2015, after two Israeli settlers notified the police of their presence.

Security forces reported their confessions for attempted murder after days of interrogation.  

The boys' families said that interrogation officers allegedly stripped the two boys, who were twelve at the time, naked and then beat them.

According to the International Solidarity Movement, Farah and Zaatari were held in solitary confinement for one year in a youth detention centre in northern Israel. This detention time was not included in the two additional years the boys must serve.