On March 14, 2013 an Israeli settler car accident resulted in severe injury of a settler girl. Dozens of youth from the nearby village of Hares (Salfit district), occupied Palestine, were arrested and harshly interrogated to confess to throwing stones at the settler car on Route 5. In January 2016, after 3 years of trial and with no evidence whatsoever, a Zionist military court sentenced five of those teenagers (Ali Shamlawi, Mohammed Suleiman, Mohammed Kleib, Tamer Souf and Ammar Souf) to 15 years in prison and a huge fine of almost $38.000 USD. 

The boys were 16-17 years old at the time of their arrest. Israel is the only country in the world that systematically prosecutes an estimated 500 to 700 children each year in military courts. During their long time in jail, they were allowed to hug their mothers just a couple of times for few minutes (during prison transfer or court hearings). Sometimes their families were not allowed to visit them for several months. Now, four of them are in the Naqab/Negev prison, except Mohammed Kleib who is in Meggido prison. Photos, as well as any physical contact, are totally forbidden for the prisoners and their families.

Almost all of the five managed to complete in jail their tawjihi (final secondary exams). Tamer Souf, Mohammed Suleiman and Ali Shamlawi are now studying History from Al Quds Open University (one of the very few options available for higher education). Their youth, studies, love, social and normal life as teenagers were suspended abruptly in 2013, and they have become young adults in Israeli prisons. Mohammed Kleib is in Meggido prison (North), while the other four are in the Negev prison (Naqab desert). 

Read the e-book released three years ago: "The Hares Boys: from Palestine to Israeli prison", which informs about the case as well as on the treatment of Palestinian children in the Israeli military court system.