Israel responded Wednesday to a UNICEF report claiming its prison service “systematically” mistreats Palestinian Authority Arab “children.”

Figures from the end of January showed that of the 233 of the “children” currently held in custody, 202 of them were over the age of 16, according to the AFP news agency.

The report, entitled, “Children in Israeli Military Detention,” claimed, “Ill treatment of Palestinian children in the Israeli military detention system appears to be widespread, systematic and institutionalized.”

In response, Israel’s Foreign Ministry said it had provided UNICEF with material used in the report and pledged to work towards implementation of its conclusions.

“Israel will study the conclusions and will work to implement them through ongoing cooperation with UNICEF, whose work we value and respect,” a Foreign Ministry statement said.

The majority of PA Arab teens incarcerated and referred to in the report were apparently arrested for hurling rocks at Israeli motorists – an act intended to kill, and which has sometimes succeeded.

Last December, a 17-year-old rock-throwing Arab nearly killed a baby when the huge rock he hurled at an Israeli car smashed the window a few inches from the infant. Mainstream media ignored the attack.

“We were saved by a miracle,” “Roie,” a resident of Samaria, told Arutz Sheva. “I do not even want to think what would have happened if the rock had hit the baby.”

A year earlier, rock-throwing road terrorists succeeded in murdering Kiryat Arba resident Asher Palmer and his toddler son, Yonaton, when they threw a rock at Palmer’s car from a passing vehicle on Highway 60 in Judea. The murder, which to police at first appeared to be a routine traffic accident, later was proved through evidence to be a terrorist attack.

In 2011 a 17-year-old PA youth, Hakim Awad, was arrested for the murder of five members of one family, including a 3-month-old baby girl.