A Jerusalem court has thrown out “showcase” indictments against three supposed “price tag” vandals and has hung another black cloud over the police and the office of the Attorney General, all of whom appear to be on a witch hunt.

The latest black eye for government prosecutors was dealt by Jerusalem Court Judge Avital Chen, who ruled there was no basis for charges that three youth from Samaria were planning to carry out some sort of attack  on Arab property.

The rejection of the government case came only a short time after a three-judge Jerusalem court unanimously ruled against the government’s charges of breach of public trust against Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, who has been hounded on various charges for more than a decade.

Many rightwing leaders have charged that dozens of police arrests of supposed price tag vandals are an attempt to blame innocent people for crimes that they say are being carried out by Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) agents trying to make the nationalist movement look illegitimate.

Considering the increasing number and severity of price tag vandalism, the accusations against the Shin Bet sound like self-righteous paranoia.

On the other hand, leftwing activists have accused government prosecutors of purposely treating price tag vandals with soft gloves and failing to convict even one of them over the past three years. Given the proven cases of Arabs damaging their own olive orchards and then blaming Jews, it is not impossible to believe that the Palestinian Authority has ordered the “price tag” operations.

The indictments that were thrown out by the Jerusalem court are the first ones ever to be filed against supposed price tag vandals.

Three young Jewish boys were arrested in September 2011 while they were carrying tools, approximately 300 feet from a vehicle that was not theirs but in which police found bottles of gasoline. Police rejects the youth’s claims that they were using the tools for renovations on a nearby structure.

The police put one and one together and came up with what they thought was two. Government prosecutors at the office of the Attorney General also thought they had done their math and put together their first indictments that were supposed to show that they finally had the goods on price tag culprits.

The court also did its math and flunked the police and prosecutors.

Michael Ironi, a lawyer for the legal aid Honenu organization, said after the court decision, “It is a shame that the Attorney General’s office chose to conduct a trial against the defendants. From the beginning of the case the evidence seemed weak and circumstantial. The suffering caused to the defendants is also regrettable.”

Honenu attorney Rehavia Piltz, who assisted in handling the case, stated, “Even from the beginning it was obvious that much ado was being made out of nothing and now the court has confirmed. It is unfortunate that in the process leading to their exoneration the rights of innocent youths were severely injured over a long period of time.”

The chase after Lieberman and dozens of alleged price tag vandals, despite being unsuccessful, also has a price tag.

“For over two years our lives have been a nightmare,” said one of the youth who finally was exonerated.

“They kept us in remand under severe conditions and falsely accused us of serious crimes,” he added. “If we had not had a religious appearance and the police and the Attorney General’s office had not been so eager to achieve ‘accomplishments’ at the expense of tarnishing the reputation of an entire population, we would not have gone through such a difficult, tortuous legal battle over something we never did.”

Police arrested two of the youth shortly before the Rosh HaShanah holiday in 2011 and convinced the court to extend their remand on the eve of the holiday. The third youth was charged the day after the holiday.

The name of “hilltop youth” in Judea and Samaria  has been muddied with accusations that have never been backed up with indictments, until the “showcase” charges that proved to be unfounded.

Every time a nationalist looks the wrong way at the police or says a bad word about Peace Now, leftwing leaders and media scream “Rabin,”  continuing 18 years of slander against all national religious Jews, and particularly their rabbis, for the assassination of Yitzchak Rabin by Yigal Amir, who lived in metropolitan Tel Aviv and not in Judea and Samaria.

It is no secret that Shin Bet agents infiltrate into communities in Judea and Samaria to incite youth to break the law and then fall prey to being informers to save themselves from prosecution.

It is hard to believe the rightwing claims that Shin Bet agents have carried out all of the price tag attacks to undermine the nationalist movement.

But it also is hard to believe that police continue to harass youth, often with middle-of-the-night arrests, and prosecutors cannot come up with even one indictment that holds any water.

The only missing key in the puzzle is the failure of most national religious leaders to conduct a campaign in their communities and yeshivas to preach against violence and anti-Arab vandalism.

If Jews indeed are guilty of the vandalism and if the police and prosecutors cannot do a better job than they did after investing thousands of hours to nail Lieberman for nothing, something is rotten in the office of the Attorney General.

Vandals set fire to a building in an Arab village Wednesday night, leaving behind a painted slogan, “Hi from Eden – revenge,” referring to Palestinian Authority terrorist victim Eden Atias who was stabbed to death on Wednesday.

A military court on Thursday extended the 16-year-old terrorist’s remand until next week, when authorities will ask to be allowed to keep him in detention until charges are brought against him.

Several hundred demonstrators tried to block roads at the western entrance to Jerusalem Thursday afternoon to demand that the IDF weed out terrorists. Police arrested at least four people.

Another “price Tel Aviv” attack against a Christian monastery was discovered Wednesday morning in what may be a case of one or two right-wing vandals who have repeatedly caused damage to Christian property as well as Israel’s image.

A firebomb was thrown at the Beit Gemal Monastery, which caused minor damage, according to police, and the words “price tag,” were spray-painted on the wall of the monastery.

The police unit for nationalist crimes is investigating the vandalism.

Police have arrested a 22-year-old Bnei Brak resident in connection with an arson and vandalism attack on the  Latrun monastery last September that drew international condemnation.

The monastery door was set alight and the names of West Bank outposts were spray-painted on the walls along with the epithet “Jesus is a monkey.” The incident was labeled a “price tag” attack in response to the evacuation last summer of Migron, a West Bank outpost.

Bnei Brak, a densely populated city of 178,000 near Tel Aviv, has a mostly Haredi Orthodox population.

An administrative restraining order was issued against the suspect from Bnei Brak, preventing him from traveling to the West Bank.

Following an Arab stone throwing attack on at least one Jewish driver near the Beit Hanina neighborhood next to Pisgat Ze’ev in Jerusalem on Thursday, Arab residents of Beit Hanina discovered on Monday that the tires on 21 of their cars had been slashed.

In addition, someone sprayed on a nearby wall, “There won’t be silence on stone throwing”. A Jewish star was painted on at least one van.

Following the terror wave of Arab stone and firebomb throwing that has struck Judea and Samaria, Arab attacks on Jews are also on the rise in certain areas of Jerusalem.

Unidentified vandals slashed the tires of 21 cars and scrawled graffiti in the eastern Jerusalem neighborhood of Beit Hanina in an apparent price tag attack early Monday morning.

They drew a Star of David and wrote, “We do not remain silent in the face of stone throwing,” but the phrase “price tag” did not appear among the graffiti, according to reports.

It is the fourth suspected ‘price tag’ attack in Jerusalem in the past month and comes less than a week after a similar attack on the Arab town of Abu Gosh, west of Jerusalem, and a week after Israel’s security Cabinet labeled “price tag” attackers as an illegal organization but stopped short of calling them terrorists.

Monday night, the tires of 28 cars parked on a street in the village of Abu Gosh, where Arab and Jewish families live, were punctured. The area was painted with graffiti messages saying: “Racism or Assimilation,” and “Arabs out.” Police began investigating the incident.

This is the first time that the a Tag Mechir (Price Tag) operation takes place in Abu Ghosh, a Christian Arab village with a rich history of supporting Jewish independence since before 1948, and the only Arab village that has kept its neutrality, even during the worst days of the Intifada.

“There is a small group of evil conspirators who want to generate a chain of hatred and violence between Arabs and Jews in our country. This group gives our enemies around the world the means with which to blacken our faces. We will not allow them to succeed.

“This week we gave police and the Shabac (GSS) wide powers to catch them.

“I urge the security forces to act strongly against this despicable phenomenon.”

News of the incident shocked local police. Police sources said this morning to Walla News: “If it was, indeed, an incident of nationalist crime, it damages the very fabric of co-existence and neighborly relations of Arabs and Jews in this friendly village. Police view this very seriously, and will devote great efforts, as it has done so far, to reaching the perpetrators, capturing them and bringing them to justice.”

Last week, on the night between Thursday and Friday, two vehicles were set on fire in a parking lot in the neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah, in East Jerusalem. A security camera recorded the ignition and the explosion. Both vehicles was damaged from the blast. The slogan Tag Mechir was spray painted on a nearby wall.

One day before the parking lot arson, the slogans Tag Mechir and Star of David symbols were spray painted on gravestones in a Christian-Orthodox cemetery in Jaffa. The tires of five parked car on a nearby street were punctured.

“Price Tag” vandals who damage and burn Arab property and spray graffiti on mosques and churches are now official an illegal organization in Israel, thanks to a Security Cabinet decision.

It is not quite clear how a group of people without any formal party or unit can be called an “illegal organization.”

The Security Cabinet stopped short of calling the price tag attackers “terrorists,” despite the insistence of Justice Minister Tzipi Livni and Public Security Minister Yitzchak Aharonovitch, who last month proposed legislation designating them as such.

Both ministers voted against the new classifications for price tag attackers, apparently thinking it is not strong enough.

The JTA contributed to this article.