Three young men from the Bedouin city of Rahat were arrested on suspicion of assaulting and harassing two Jewish teens, aged 17 and 18, in Beersheba's municipal skate park.
It is suspected that the incident began after one of the teens began talking to a girl accompanying two of the Bedouin youth, both 17, going so far as to ask her why she would "hang around with Bedouins."
From there, the situation rapidly escalated when one of the Bedouin teenagers called his 20-year-old brother over to the park and the three began assaulting the two Jewish teens.
Due to the men's young age, the suspects – all from the same local family – were released to house arrest. Police intend to indict the three Bedouin youth.Security camera footage published by Channel 12 News shows one of them breaking the skateboard of one of the victims.
"We arrived at the place, started riding there and suddenly two 'minorities' came to us," one of the victims told Channel 12 on Wednesday. "They pushed me and started hitting. I tried to calm things down but saw that there was nothing I could do. He hit me, I punched him, he pushed me into the fence and tried to throw a rock at me, took out a shiv to try and stab me.
"I told him 'hey man, we don't want to get involved, let's stop' and then the other one came and punched me straight in the eye," the victim continued. "He continued hitting, I ran away to a nearby neighborhood and they kept chasing me."
The older sister of one of the victims added that "after [the assault], they were still sending him messages and threats claiming that they would hurt him.
"We were very scared because we knew that they knew where we live. We changed our locks at home; my brother didn't leave the house for two weeks," she said. "I decided I had to end it: the fears and anxieties that have come to our home. I went to all their friends and searched for their addresses and phone numbers. I collected pictures and handed everything to the police, who opened the investigation."