Olympia Responds to Day of Action Against Caterpillar

On Friday, October 19th, the Rachel Corrie Foundation was hosted by the local Fellowship of Reconciliation for an afternoon rush-hour demonstration in downtown Olympia. The event served to draw attention to Caterpillar, Inc.’s role in human rights violations in Palestine. Olympia activists joined the US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation, a national coalition, and its member groups across the country, in asking Caterpillar to stop profiting from sales of bulldozers and other equipment used by the Israel Defense Forces to commit human rights violations against Palestinians. On this wet and windy day at Olympia’s Percival Landing, a group of about twenty-five gathered, including a vibrant horn band playing peace and justice songs. Large photos were displayed depicting the illegal use of Caterpillar equipment in Palestine and noting, “CAT Knows.”

Passersby were urged to sign postcards to Washington State Senators Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell, and Representatives Brian Baird and Adam Smith, asking them to support an investigation into Israel’s misuse of CAT equipment in the Occupied Territories as possible violations of the US Arms Export Control Act, the Foreign Assistance Act, and the Leahy Amendment.

The protest marked the eve of the one-month anniversary of the Israel Defense Forces’ killing of a 19-year-old Palestinian teenager, Mahmoud al-Kifafi. According to the Al Mezan Center for Human Rights, al-Kifafi was shot in the neck and then killed when he was hit in the head by the blade of a Caterpillar bulldozer. The same Israeli military incursion also destroyed thirteen Palestinian homes and razed agricultural land and olive trees.