The Israeli Army uses giant Caterpillar tractors to bulldoze Palestinian homes by the thousand. Liat Weingart, co-director of San Francisco based Jewish Voice for Peace, describes her trip to the Caterpillar annual meeting here.
"I am faced with the daunting yet exhilarating task of presenting the first shareholder resolution in US history examining a corporation's relationship with the Israeli occupation.
"The resolution is the brainchild of JVP members and remarkably, through their sustained efforts, they have made it real: JVPers wrote the resolution, found people to introduce it at the shareholders meeting, waged a letter-writing campaign that generated 30,000 letters to the board of directors of Caterpillar and 40,000 messages to Caterpillar dealerships, devised creative local protests, and worked hard to make sure that the major news wire services are on hand to shine a light on the use of CAT bulldozers to destroy Palestinian homes. "
..."Activists all over the world have been focusing on Caterpillar's Achilles heel for some time. The corporation has a widely-recognized name and brand. For a long time, that brand stood only for durability and the building of infrastructure. But the use of Caterpillar equipment in human rights abuses in Palestine has opened the company to attack from people of conscience all over the world. Caterpillar bulldozers razed an entire neighborhood in the West Bank refugee camp of Jenin, leaving about 4,000 people --almost a quarter of the camp--homeless. It's estimated that since 1967, Caterpillar equipment has been used by the IDF to make over 50,000 people homeless. "
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