Footage of an Israeli settler clubbing a dog belonging to a Palestinian family in the West Bank village of Atara has spread widely in the days since the incident, The New York Times reported.
Tied to an olive tree to escape the heat, the eighteen-month-old Belgian Malinois named Lucy was struck over the head by a settler who arrived wielding two clubs, one in each hand, according to The Times. The dog's owners recorded the attack on video.
The resulting video, which The Times described as extremely hard to watch, captures Lucy crying out and straining against her restraints in a futile attempt to escape, according to the outlet.
Before this incident, Atara had seen a more familiar form of settler pressure — tactics designed to force Palestinian residents off their land, with homes, grazing fields, and agricultural plots steadily absorbed into settler-controlled territory, according to The Times. Throughout the West Bank, extremist settlers have attacked Palestinians physically, looted their animals, razed olive groves, and set fire to cars and homes — acts for which they are almost never prosecuted, The Times reported.
