Bulldozer Attack

07/15/2008

Maryland Herald Mail

Was bulldozer attack truly a 'senseless' act?

To the editor:

Perhaps you saw The Herald-Mail story about the Palestinian laborer who, early in July, rammed Jerusalem buses with a bulldozer. According to the report, Israel called the attack a "senseless act."

That struck me as an odd thing for Israel to say - the state that wrote the book on using armored bulldozers as tools of aggression; the country that inspired human-rights organizations worldwide to boycott Caterpillar. (Google "boycott + Caterpillar").

Even the United Methodist Church is involved.

Haaretz.com, the online edition of the Jewish newspaper, reports that the church opened discussions in February of this year on a resolution calling for divestment from Caterpillar because the company supplies Israel with bulldozers that are used to demolish Palestinian homes and to imprison entire areas of Palestinian civilians with massive concrete walls.

According to the human-rights organization Jewish Voice for Peace, the Israeli army has used Caterpillar equipment to destroy more than 12,000 houses in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem, sometimes with the residents still inside!

Jewish Voice for Peace says that the demolitions are usually carried out without warning, often at night, and the occupants are given no time to salvage their belongings. Tens of thousands of men, women and children are homeless and destitute as a result.

Imagine your horror if you were to be awakened in the middle of the night by armed aggressors bulldozing down your house. Where would you go? What would you do?

To make matters even worse (if that is possible), Israel also has used the thundering machines to uproot hundreds of thousands of centuries-old olive trees as well as date, prune, lemon and orange orchards, leaving entire families not only homeless but also broke, hungry and with no means of earning a living.

So what do you think? Was the Palestinian laborer's bulldozer attack on Jerusalem buses a "senseless act?" Or was it a classic case of someone only doing what they've seen done?

G. F. Miller
Hagerstown