Israeli prosecutors recently indicted three Palestinians over the Jan. 25 assault of a Jewish teenager in the Samaria city of Huwara, the Israel Police said on Tuesday, in an incident described as a severe lynching that nearly resulted in the victim’s death.
The indictment follows the arrest of six suspects following a joint investigation by the Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) and the Israel Border Police’s Judea and Samaria investigations and intelligence unit, police said.
“According to the findings of the investigation, on Jan. 25, 2026, information was received from the Shin Bet regarding a Jewish teenager who had entered the Huwara area, where he was violently attacked by several local residents. As a result of the assault, the teenager lost consciousness and the suspects believed he was dead,” according to the statement.
Following the report, security agencies carried out “intelligence-gathering and investigative operations” that led to the arrest of six suspects. Indictments were filed over the weekend against three of those involved.
“The investigation revealed that this was a serious security incident with characteristics of a lynching,” police stated.
The Israeli Foreign Ministry in an X post on Tuesday described the incident as terrorism, adding: “Call it what it is.”
“A Jewish teenager was lynched in Huwara by Palestinian thugs. Beaten unconscious until they thought he was dead,” the ministry tweeted. “Three suspects have been charged. Arrested by Israeli Border Police forces.”
Palestinian terrorists targeted Israeli Jews in Judea and Samaria at least 5,051 times in 2025, according to figures published by the Rescuers Without Borders (Hatzalah Judea and Samaria) NGO last month.
Twenty-four Israelis were murdered in Judea and Samaria in 2025, and more than 400 others were wounded, the NGO said in its annual report.
The data, which were cross-checked against official data from the Jewish state’s security agencies, included 3,299 instances of rock-throwing, 458 attacks with Molotov cocktails, 655 attempts to blind drivers with laser pointers, 286 explosive charges and 19 terrorist shooting assaults.
Four Israelis were murdered in Huwara—4.5 miles south of Nablus (Shechem) in central Samaria—in two separate attacks in 2023: brothers Hallel and Yagel Yaniv in February and father and son Shay Silas and Aviad Nir Nigrekar in August.
Dual Israeli-U.S. citizen David Stern, 41, narrowly survived a shooting on March 19, 2023, while he was driving through Huwara with his wife. Six days later, two IDF soldiers were wounded in a drive-by shooting.
