An Israeli court in Jerusalem today sentenced two 13-year-old Palestinian boys from occupied East Jerusalem to two years in an Israeli juvenile detention centre after the two were charged with attempted murder and possession of knives.

Muhammad Mahmoud, a lawyer for the defence, told Ma’an that Shadi Anwar Farah and Ahmad Raed Zatari were sentenced to two years of imprisonment in an Israeli juvenile facility.

Mahmoud added that Farah and Zatari were initially detained on 12 December 2015, but the period they have already spent in detention would not be counted toward the sentence handed down to them.

Exactly a year ago, Farah and Zaatari were charged with attempted murder and possession of knives, after Israeli forces allegedly found knives carrying knives during a stop-and-search in Jerusalem.

Amjad Abu Asab, who heads a Jerusalem committee for prisoners’ families, said at the time that both children were “interrogated in the absence of adult family members and lawyers, which is a serious violation of Israeli law and international law.”

Abu Asab added that the Jerusalem central court also ordered each of the boys’ families to pay a bail of 5,000 shekels ($1,297).

According to prisoners’ rights group Addameer, 400 Palestinian children were being held in Israeli custody as of October.