(JTA) — Israeli police closed their investigation into a severe settler beating of Palestinians that drew international condemnation.
Ha’aretz on Friday reported that police shut down the investigation, partly because of a lack of cooperation from local settlers.
Three Palestinian shepherds were allowing their flocks to graze near the West Bank settlement of Sussia when three masked settlers ordered them to leave on June 8, 2008. They refused, and a while later four masked men arrived and beat them with clubs. The beating was caught on video by a relative who had been supplied with a camera by B’Tselem, an Israeli human rights group.
All three — including a 57-year-old woman and her 70-year-old husband — required hospitalization, and the case drew demands for greater protection for Palestinians.
