The most horrifying aspect of two recent high-profile Israeli attacks on Palestinians was that some perpetrators were minors as young as 12. Three boys, aged 12-13, from the radical Bat Ayim settlement in the West Bank, have been detained in connection with the August 16 fire-bombing of a taxi carrying six Palestinians, four adults and two small children, along a highway near their home village of Nahalin. While the twin boys sustained first degree burns, their elders suffered second and third degree burns. The perpetrators were said to attend a religious school.

Shortly after this assault, six fire bombs were hurled at cars near Tapuah junction in the West Bank. The Tapuah colony is also well known for extremist activity, but nothing has been done to curb it.

On August 17, seven Israeli teenagers, aged between 13 and 19, were arrested for attacking Palestinians in Zion Square, in the centre of West Jerusalem. They beat to the ground one youth, Jamal Julani, 17, and kicked him until he was unconscious. He was taken to hospital in a coma.

The detained Israelis belonged to a group chanting anti-Arab slogans as they strolled through the pedestrian thoroughfare. Bystanders did not try to stop the assault; some even harassed ambulance staff who were treating Julani. Those involved in the violence expressed no regrets and one lad stated: “He could die for all I care — he’s an Arab.”

The second incident took place in “Israel proper” — rather than in the occupied Palestinian territories which an old friend used to call “Israel improper”. While both Palestinians and Israelis have often dubbed the West Bank the “wild West Bank”, because settlers and soldiers are free to do whatever they like, West Jerusalem is an area where law and order are meant to prevail.

Although some Israelis — and the US State Department — classified such incidents as “terrorism”, it remains to be seen what happens to the juveniles who are accused of participating in these well-publicised attacks.

There is no doubt that the assaults were racially motivated and a consequence of decades of Israeli discrimination against, abuse of, and incitement against “Aravim” (Arabs). Few Israelis — even those with good intentions — refer to the Arabs of Palestine as Palestinians. By doing so, Israelis would be designating them as owners of the land claimed by Israel.

For many Israelis, “Aravim” are merely obstacles to the Zionist enterprise of transforming Palestine into Erez Israel. They are to be shunned, marginalized and confined to ghettoes. They are not allowed to live in Jewish neighbourhoods, towns or cities. Israelis of Palestinian origin are consigned to the lowest class of citizenship — below Mizrahim (Oriental Jews) and Ethiopian Jews — and face constant discrimination.

It is significant that the attacks by Israeli minors on Palestinians in both the West Bank and West Jerusalem coincided with a report by Breaking the Silence, a group formed in 2004 by ex-soldiers with the aim of exposing abuse of Palestinian children by Israeli troops.

The report includes the testimonies of 30 former officers and soldiers who witnessed cruelty, torture and abuse of Palestinian children. These testimonies — selected from more than 850 — “serve as witness to the ongoing slide of the military system toward increasing immorality”.

One former soldier said he saw his commander beat a Palestinian boy “to a pulp” and then, in front of the boy’s parents, put the barrel of a gun into his mouth and warned that if anyone tries to interfere he would kill the boy.

Bored soldiers provoke Palestinians to protest by smashing the windows of shops, houses and mosques, particularly during prayers, and then use violence to put down the protests.

A former sailor said Israeli patrol boats would fire shots at children on the beach in Gaza.

In spite of court rulings prohibiting the use of children as human shields or for scouting homes before Israeli troops enter (“neighbour procedure”), Israeli troops routinely breach his ban — with impunity.

Israel’s culture of impunity was manifest on Tuesday when a Haifa court ruled that the Israeli state was not responsible for the death of US human rights activist Rachel Corrie who was crushed by an army bulldozer in 2003 while trying to prevent the demolition of Palestinian houses in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip.

Since most potentially abusive Israeli children eventually enter the army, it is hardly surprising that soldiers behave the way they do towards Palestinian children, women and men.

The attitude of Israeli children towards Palestinians is determined by their parents, teachers, rabbis, schoolbooks and religious texts.

Last weekend, the former chief Sephardi rabbi of Israel, Ovadia Yosef — who used to promote a moderate line — called for prayers for Iran’s destruction. When “we ask God to ‘bring an end to our enemies,’ we should be thinking about Iran, those evil ones that threaten Israel. May the Lord destroy the Iranian regime,” he was quoted as saying.

Eleven years ago, Yosef, then Sephardi chief rabbi, said: “… it is forbidden to be merciful to [Arabs]. You must send missiles to them and annihilate them. They are evil and damnable.”

When such words come out of the mouths of highly respected men of religion, how can teenagers be expected to behave humanely towards people who are cursed as eternal enemies?