HEBRON (Ma'an) -- Israeli settlers on Wednesday assaulted Palestinian school children in the southern West Bank, a school official said.

A school principal told Ma'an that a group of extremist Israeli settlers hurled stones at school girls in the village of al-Tuwani, leaving them bruised.

Israeli soldiers stood by and watched without taking action as the settlers threw rocks, the principal said.

The girls who sustained injuries were identified as Kifah Omar Abu Jundiyya and Dalal Awad Zein, both seventh graders.

In al-Tuwani and other areas in the southern Hebron district, school children on a daily basis wait at checkpoints for Israeli soldiers to let them through locked gates.

Regardless of Israeli military presence, settler attacks on children en route to and from school remain commonplace, the principal said.

In 2013, there were 399 incidents of settler violence against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

Over 90 percent of investigations into settler violence by Israeli police fail to lead to an indictment.

More than 500,000 Israeli settlers live in settlements across the West Bank and East Jerusalem, in contravention of international law.

Source: Ma'an News Agency