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Study: Violence Begets Violence Among Palestinian, Israeli Youth

A study shows Palestinian and Israeli children act more violently because they're exposed to so much violence. Palestinian kids were found to have both the highest exposure to violence and highest levels of aggression. Mairav Zonszein writes for Al-Monitor.
The daughter of Thair Al-Baik, a Palestinian militant from the Al-Qassam brigades, the armed wing of the Hamas movement, mourns during her father's funeral in Jabalya, in the northern Gaza Strip June 21, 2012. The bodies of two militants, including Al-Baik, were recovered on Thursday in a tunnel at a Hamas training camp which was hit by an Israeli air strike on Tuesday, Hamas sources said. REUTERS/Mohammed Salem (GAZA - Tags: POLITICS CIVIL UNREST)

Early on the morning of Aug. 17, a Palestinian youth was beaten unconscious by a mob of Israeli teenagers in West Jerusalem’s Zion Square. The assailants were teenagers, some as young as 13, and many more youths allegedly stood around and watched. One perpetrator told the press that as far as he is concerned, the victim should die because “he is an Arab."  

In a separate incident the night before, a Molotov cocktail was hurled at a Palestinian taxi driving in the West Bank, injuring the family in it, including a 4-year-old child. The primary suspects in what has been deemed a “terror attack” by Israeli leaders are adolescents from an Israeli settlement of Bat Ayin. 

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