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Caterpillar Bulldozes Peace
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Margaret Sarfehjooy, W A M M
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On April 13th, a group of Minnesotans joined the International Day of Action against Caterpillar by protesting the company's sales of home-crushing bulldozers to Israel. Endorsers included Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, the National Council of Churches (representing 36 Christian faiths,) the Presbyterian Church USA (with over 2.4 million members,) Jewish Voice for Peace (a California-based grassroots organization), and the Roman Catholic Sisters of Loretto, whose motto is, "women should and can provide something more than ordinary in the face of the common need." The Day of Action was held on April 13th, the day that a shareholder resolution at Caterpillar's national headquarters in Chicago was scheduled. The resolution was calling for Caterpillar to investigate whether the sale of bulldozers to Israel violates the CAT "good global citizen" code of conduct. Although the resolution received only a 3 percent vote, it was backed by investors with holdings estimated to be well over $600 million dollars, including CalPERS, the largest pension fund in the world.
Michael Passoff is associate director of the Corporate Social Responsibility program As You Sow Foundation. Passoff said: "That size vote is common for a resolution as controversial as this one. That shareholders with holdings worth over half a billion dollars voted yes on our resolution is a victory because it means mainstream investors were voting for this issue, not just social investors.
Today's public protests against CAT in over 30 cities and CAT's 3 percent drop in stock price today assure that the company will have to deal with this issue sooner rather than later. And if not sooner, then we expect to be back next year with another resolution."
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– photo © CircleVision.org |
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In front of Ziegler Inc, the Midwest Caterpillar distributor in Bloomington on April 13, 2005 |
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Locally, a group of around 30 activists, with signs and handouts, stood in front of Ziegler Inc, the Midwest Caterpillar distributor in Bloomington, to many indifferent, some curious and occasionally hostile passersby. This made me realize the uphill battle we face in attempting to educate the public about where our tax dollars are really going.
Since 1967, CAT bulldozers have destroyed over 12,000 homes in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem, leaving over 50,000 Palestinian children, women, and men homeless. Caterpillar originally made bulldozers for farm equipment, but the home-destroying bulldozers are designed specifically for home demolition - Palestinian homes. The D11, which costs $1.2 million and weighs 60 tons with full armor, is so large that a sizable SUV would fit with ease in its blade. They can now even be operated by remote control, in order to reduce casualties to the Israeli Defense Force operating them.
These bulldozers are building the separation wall through Palestinian territories, demolishing the homes of innocent Palestinians, and clearing Palestinian land in order to make way for more Israeli settlements and new roads that only Israelis may drive on. Hundreds of acres of Palestinian farmland ended up on the Israeli side of the wall, and this stolen land is now being cleared by bulldozers to make room for Israeli settlements. It is estimated that approximately 90 percent of the Palestinians' fresh water will also end up on Israel's side of the wall when it is all completed.
Why should we protest companies like Caterpillar? Shamai Leibowitz, an Israeli "refusenik" who served in the Israeli army in the occupied West Bank, eloquently stated the following: "For years, American taxpayers' money has been responsible for the torture chambers, for the massive military raids of Palestinian cities and villages, for home demolitions, and for the building of illegal Jewish-only settlements on confiscated Palestinian land. Since the Israeli occupation began in 1967, Israel has taken a huge amount of American money-some estimate it at 100 billion dollars- and poured it into building and maintaining the infrastructure of the occupation. American money should not be enabling such gross human rights violations and war crimes."
We should heed and publicize this call to action: a plea to American civic institutions and individuals to remove all their investments from Israel Bonds, which support and maintain the occupation, and to divest from companies that sell arms and other military equipment to Israel. This includes companies such as Caterpillar, which builds and sells the bulldozers used to demolish Palestinian homes. American money is thus responsible for the demolition of thousands of Palestinian homes by the Israeli army, and for the subsequent thousands of Palestinians left homeless. American money is also responsible for the Israeli Caterpillar bulldozer that ran over 23-year-old American peace activist Rachel Corrie, crushing her to death in Gaza.
For more information about Caterpillar, see online.
Margaret Sarfehjooy is a member of the WAMM Middle East Committee. She is married with two adult children and works as a RN at Fairview Southdale Hospital. She is also a member of the Palestine Solidarity Coalition, Minnesota. |
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© 2005 Women Against Military Madness. All rights reserved.
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Complete June 2005 Index - click here
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