Four days ago, police arrested a different suspect, a 21-year-old from the Beit Hanina neighborhood of East Jerusalem. He was arrested after uploading the video to social media, though he is no longer suspected of slapping the teenage boys.
A caption above the video in Arabic had read: “You will continue to delete and I will continue to upload. It’s either the Palestinian people or you.”
The video caused an uproar online, with many sharing a phone number they claimed belonged to the suspect, calling to flood him with messages over the assault.
Israelis wearing face masks walk past the light rail near the Mahane Yehuda market in Jerusalem on December 21, 2020. (Olivier Fitoussi/Flash90)
A spokesperson for the police said the investigation is ongoing.
The video caused an uproar online, with many sharing a phone number they claimed belonged to the suspect, calling to flood him with messages over the assault.
On Friday, the father of one of the boys told the Kan public broadcaster his 14-year-old son returned home “upset, humiliated and afraid” following the incident.
“I told my son that from now on, he won’t take the light rail and we’ll make sure someone takes him. Today it’s a slap, tomorrow it could be something worse,” he said.
The father of the arrested suspect told Army Radio his son had nothing to do with the incident, saying that he just “received the video and uploaded it to Tiktok.”