On June 10, the Israeli State Prosecutor’s Office filed an indictment against a 16-year-old Jewish minor for a racially motivated attack on a dog belonging to a Palestinian family. West Bank District Police Commander Moshe Pinchi – who, on a daily basis, implements National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir’s promise to grant impunity to the “Hilltop Youth,” and under whose command, since he took office in September 2024, pogroms and acts of Jewish terrorism have unfolded incessantly – told the media: “This is a severe and shocking case of cruel animal abuse, an act that violates the most basic human values and provokes revulsion and horror across all sectors of society, regardless of community, religion, ethnicity, or nationality. I would like to express my appreciation to the commanders and officers of the task force headquarters, who acted with determination, professionalism, and dedication.”In contrast to the dog’s case, in the rare instances when indictments are filed against Jews who attack Palestinian civilians, they generally do not include a racist motive. It is as though far-right activists simply choose people at random to assault – without regard to religion or ethnicity – and, by sheer coincidence, the victims are always Palestinians rather than Jews.‘A terrorism case’From the outset, at the very investigative stage, when a Palestinian attacks a Jew, the incident is automatically treated as a terrorism case, with substantial personnel and investigative resources assigned to it. By contrast, when a Jew attacks a Palestinian, the case is usually handled as an ordinary criminal matter and given low priority – unless proven otherwise. By the time the police and prosecutors are “convinced” that an incident was nationalist and racist in nature, it is often too late to conduct an effective investigation.This pattern is evident in a long series of cases we have handled through the ‘Tag Meir Forum’. In one example, in November 2021, far-right activists drove near Bethlehem and threw stones and other objects from their vehicle at Palestinian cars traveling in the opposite direction. When they hurled a metal bar or stone at the windshield of a car carrying a father and his 10-year-old son, the father suffered a head injury and the vehicle overturned. For an extended period, the police and prosecutors treated the incident as an ordinary traffic accident, despite separate complaints from other Palestinian drivers who reported that objects had been thrown at their vehicles. By the time prosecutors finally recognised – following our repeated appeals – that the attack had been nationalist and racist in nature, it was already too late to complete the collection of evidence from the scene, and the suspects who had been apprehended remained silent during questioning.‘I know my tractor is still there with them’In November 2025, members of a “Hilltop Youth” group carrying out ethnic cleansing of Palestinian communities around the outpost they established near Nablus approached a 75-year-old Palestinian farmer while he was working his land with a tractor. They threatened him with a handgun, beat him, stole cash and his cellphone, and drove his tractor into the outpost. About 15 minutes after the attack ended, a police patrol arrived. The farmer and his son told the officer what had happened and pointed to the tractor standing inside the outpost. Instead of driving there to arrest the attackers and recover the tractor, the officer took the farmer to the police station in the settlement Ariel.Also read: How Looting Became Embedded in Israeli Military OperationsAt the station, the farmer told an investigator that he had seen the “Hilltop Youth” drive his tractor into the outpost. “I know my tractor is still there with them. I saw it before I came here,” he said, adding that “the police vehicle came to the scene and didn’t go up to retrieve my tractor. I pointed it out to him and told him that only fifteen minutes before he arrived, they had driven it up there.”The police and prosecutors handled the case as an ordinary armed robbery rather than as a crime motivated by nationalist and racist intent. Eventually, prosecutors closed the case after failing to identify the attackers – a hardly surprising outcome given that no police officer dared enter the outpost, recover the tractor, or arrest the “Hilltop Youth.” This was despite our repeated appeals and despite the fact that they remained at the outpost for several more months, during which they continued attacking and robbing other Palestinians.‘We’ll smash your face’One morning in December 2025, two Jews – an adult and a minor – embarked on a spree of violence in Jerusalem reminiscent of A Clockwork Orange. According to the indictment, they approached a bus, smashed one of its mirrors, threw it at the driver, kicked him, and shouted, “We’ll smash your face.” They then moved on to a second bus, assaulted its driver, threw a trash can at his head, and caused a serious injury to his arm. Next, they attacked a street cleaner, repeatedly punching and kicking him in the head and across his body, and broke his teeth and ribs. Although the cleaner and both bus drivers were Palestinians, prosecutors concluded that the attacks were not racially motivated and transferred the case to the police prosecution unit. As a result, the indictment stated, rather oddly, that the two assailants had “resolved to attack and injure public employees,” as though it were mere coincidence that all three victims happened to be Palestinian.It is no coincidence that prosecutors chose to file a racially motivated indictment in the case involving the dog, while declining to do so in the armed robbery of the farmer, the attack on the vehicle, or the assault on the street cleaner and the two bus drivers.This reflects a longstanding policy of the Prosecutor’s Office, one that appears to stem from two considerations.The first is narrative. Much like Israel’s political leadership, prosecutors generally avoid defining attacks on Palestinians as racially motivated and avoid acknowledging the existence of Jewish terrorism, thereby seeking to prevent accusations from the political right that the prosecution service is “left-wing.”The second is practical. A racist motive doubles the potential sentence. Omitting it from indictments makes it easier to reach plea agreements that carry relatively light penalties, thereby avoiding lengthy criminal proceedings that are often politically sensitive in Israel. Such proceedings are frequently complicated by investigative failures and negligent conduct on the part of police officers who pursue cases of violence against Palestinians with little enthusiasm. In the absence of a racist motive, prosecutors can simply pass the matter to the police prosecution unit, which is authorised to handle offences carrying lower sentencing thresholds.If, in the eyes of the Prosecutor’s Office, a dog enjoys higher status than a Palestinian person, then it bears no less responsibility for the unchecked rise of Jewish terrorism and racist violence than the politicians who incite it.Eitay Mack is an Israeli lawyer and human rights activist.