We were surprised that María Inés Taracena’s article from June 16, “Caterpillar Concerns,” did not mention the global campaign against Caterpillar for its complicity in the Israeli Occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
Caterpillar sells specialized bulldozers that Israel weaponizes and uses to further the Occupation and expand settlements. Israel’s Occupation depends on the destruction of Palestinian homes and infrastructure, and the construction of illegal settlements, checkpoints, walls, and segregated roads. An armored Caterpillar D9 or D10 bulldozer can destroy a home within minutes, and sometimes with not much more warning to its inhabitants.
In 2003, when a Caterpillar bulldozer crushed 23-year old American peace activist Rachel Corrie, the U.S. campaign against Caterpillar’s bulldozer sales to Israel took off. Initially led by the Sisters of Loreto, whose Catholic order held stock in Caterpillar, it has since expanded greatly. Many U.S. churches, including the Presbyterian Church-USA, United Church of Christ, Unitarian Universalists, Mennonite Central Committee, and Quaker Friends Fiduciary Corporation, have divested from Caterpillar. Retirement company TIAA-CREF divested from Caterpillar, and Caterpillar was removed from the MSCI’s socially responsible company index in 2012. A number of colleges and universities have also voted to divest from Caterpillar.
Caterpillar has steadfastly rejected shareholder resolutions and outside calls for accountability. There is no reason that a company that does such a brisk business in civilian equipment needs to make and sell what are essentially military machines, although we fear that this is also what will be happening along our own border. Between the city’s security contract with private prison company G4S and this new deal with Caterpillar, we are concerned that Tucson’s business decisions do not reflect our values a a city.
—Abby Okrent
Jewish Voice for Peace – Tucson
This article appears in Jun 23-29, 2016.
Really? Because the Israelis probably couldn’t just buy a bulldozer from someone else?
At least they didn’t buy Chinese.
Israel only buys the best.
If Israel can buy bulldozers to weaponize from some other country, then let them. We don’t have to provide Israel with the means to murder her neighbors. But of course we do, because Israel controls so much of our country: Wall Street, White House, Hollywood, etc. And, hey! It makes money! Human suffering be damned.
Palestine has not been caged in, Palestine has been locked out. For more good reasons than the Jew haters can count. How many Jews can I blow up today, let me count the ways.
The Palestinian Authority also buys and uses Caterpillar equipment within the West Bank and Hamas does the same thing in Gaza. If they could figure out a way to use these things to kill Israeli civilians they probably would, but for now they are using them to rebuild the homes of terrorists that the Israelis knock down. Why are both sides using Caterpillar? Because it is a tool! This is a tool and equipment maker. We aren’t talking about a bomb maker moving to Tucson or anything like that, oh wait they are already here….
In light of what happened in Orlando is also bears mentioning that homosexuals are brutally persecuted by the cultural norms within the Palestinian Authority and Hamas. They are beaten and killed, their families are publicly shamed and they are prevented from participating in society on any meaningful level. Israel is the only open, free society in the middle east where homosexuals can live out and open lives without fear.
There are no good guys and no bad guys in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Simply a lot of flawed human beings making emotional decisions based on fear, limited resources, religion and more fear. We should not let this get in the way of economic progress here in Tucson where an equipment manufacturer wants to bring high paying, good jobs. Something we have not gotten in a long, long time. Maybe you would prefer another call center?
Religion is irrational.