The Light we Lost

 

 

Rachel Corrie, an Amazing Light

Born, April 10, 1979

Crossed over, March 16, 2003

  The Israeli Defense Forces ended her life with a CAT D-9 bulldozer, because she cared about the Palestinian people. 

Rachel’s Words in Print

When she was a ten-year-old child in Olympia Washington, Rachel 
delivered a speech at her fifth grade press conference on world hunger:

"I'm here for other children.

I'm here because I care.

    I'm here because children everywhere are suffering and because forty thousand people die each day from hunger.

I'm here because those people are mostly children.

We have got to understand that the poor are all around us and we are ignoring them.

We have got to understand that these deaths are preventable.

We have got to understand that people in the Third World countries think and care and smile and cry just like us.

We have got to understand that they dream our dreams and we dream theirs.

We have got to understand that they are us.  We are them.

My dream is to stop hunger by the year 2000.

My dream is to save the forty thousand people who die each day.

My dream can and will come true if we all look into the future and see the light that shines there.

If we all help and work together, it will grow and burn free with the potential of tomorrow."

Rachel Corrie

Excerpted from, Her Name Was Rachel Corrie, which is primarily from Rachel's own writings and worth reading:  http://www.rense.com/general73/name.htm

This speech, featuring 10 year old Rachel Corrie, is available on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDq32EgMxb8

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Rachel Corrie was an American citizen.  She traveled to Palestine as a volunteer with the International Solidarity Movement in January 2003.  She went, because she cared. Her work there was primarily to be a witness to the inhumane conditions and atrocities imposed on Palestinian people by Israel.  There was also the profound hope that the presence of international citizens would help protect Palestinian people, their homes, and necessary infrastructure, just by their presence. 

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Quotes from Rachel Corrie's writing while she was in Palestine.

"We are protecting civilians. We are unarmed. We are no threat to you. Please do not shoot."

"Sometimes I sit down to dinner with people and I realize there is a massive military machine surrounding us, trying to kill the people I'm having dinner with."

“We should be inspired by people... who show that human beings can be kind, brave, generous, beautiful, strong-even in the most difficult circumstances.” 

"I feel like I'm witnessing the systematic destruction of a people's ability to survive. It's horrifying." 

“This has to stop. I think it is a good idea for us all to drop everything and devote our lives to making this stop. I don’t think it’s an extremist thing to do anymore."

From: Brainy Quotes,  Good Reads,  and the article: 'Rachel Corrie’s Parents Journey to Palestine.'

 

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Learn More ~

For a deeper understanding of what she thought, you may also want to read Rachel's e-mails from Palestine,  available on the Rachel Corrie Foundation for Peace and Justice's web site:  http://rachelcorriefoundation.org/rachel/emails

Rachel Corrie's very moving book, Let Me Stand Alone, W.W. Norton & Company, is available on request from libraries, book stores, and on-line.  For more information please see:  http://letmestandalone.com/

Follow the Rachel Corrie Foundation on facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/rcfoundation

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On March 16, 2003,  Rachel was crushed to death by the IDF.  Even though there were four eyewitnesses to this murder, Israel has absolved itself and all parties involved of any wrong doing.  

She will not be forgotten! 

From Wikimedia Commons

“This has to stop. I think it is a good idea for us all to drop everything and devote our lives to making this stop."  

Rachel Corrie

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Take Action!  

Boycott Caterpillar for its complicity and profiteering from the illegal occupation and Rachel Corrie's murder:  http://boycott4peace.blogspot.com/2014/12/caterpillar-corporate-conscientiousness.html

Check out our complete boycott list:
http://boycott4peace.blogspot.com/2014/12/boycott-list.html 

And our Quick Actions:
http://boycott4peace.blogspot.com/search/label/Quick%20action

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Boycott for Peace! 

http://boycott4peace.blogspot.com/

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Caterpillar: Corporate Complicity

Boycott Caterpillar for Complicity with the Occupation

Caterpillar, Inc's  own "Living by the Code" of  so called "integrity, excellence, teamwork, and commitment in order to make the world a better place to live" is seriously challenged by daily destruction of Palestinian agricultural land, Palestinian home demolitions and human deaths the Israeli military performs using Caterpillar  D-9 bulldozers in Palestine.

Middle East director of Human Rights Watch, Sarah Leah, believes Caterpillar betrays its stated values when it sells Israel bulldozers that in return illegally destroy Palestinian homes, agricultural land, uproot olive trees and demolish roads,  and destroy electricity and sewage lines. She states that Caterpillar is complicit in human rights abuses in Palestine because it pushes Palestinians into a cycle of poverty and dependency when it destroys their source of livelihood.

In 1967 B’Tselem recorded the entire neighborhood of Hawashin was leveled using Caterpillar’s D-9 bulldozers in Operation Defensive Shield. In 2004 John Dugard, a United Nations Special Rapporteur, witnessed D-9 bullbozers dig up 50% of roads in Gaza, and destroy 40 miles of water and sewage lines in Rafah. Overall, in the last four years 25000 homes in Gaza have been demolished using D-9 bulldozers

During the second Intifada in the 2000s Israeli military forces adapted a military strategy known as the pressure cooker. This strategy is used when a targeted Palestinian seeks refuge in a building and refuses to come out. In this situation, Israeli officials use Caterpillar’s D-9 to shake the building and then gradually peel off the wall until ultimately destroying the building and burying the victims underneath the rubble. This strategy is based on an extrajudicial system of execution where the targeted Palestinians are deemed criminals under the Israeli system of governance because all legitimate and lawful resistance to Israeli occupation is considered unlawful. Please see more here: http://www.bdsmovement.net/2014/how-israel-uses-caterpillar-machinery-to-carry-out-extrajudicial-executions-12475

In an ironic twist, Israel has begun a campaign against Caterpillar Inc., for supplying Iran with equipment. In the enclosed advertisement Israel has compared supplying Iran with material akin to assisting them in the construction of the Iranian nuclear program. The image of the billboard is here: http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/adri-nieuwhof/home-demolitions-beit-hanina-executed-volvo-and-hyundai-equipment

Rachel Corrie, a U.S. citizen and activist, is an example of the harm Caterpillar’s D-9 has on human life in Palestine. In an attempt to try to prevent Israeli officials from demolishing a Palestinian home Rachel had sand dumped over her and then run over by the D-9. The potential energy from this one life that has been cut short is clearly seen in this tribute to her: http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=rachel+corrie&FORM=VIRE2#view=detail&mid=B4C8C0018CF148807B43B4C8C0018CF148807B43
(Please see comments for up-dates on the Rachel Corrie case.)

 

In a response to Human Rights Watch letter Caterpillar, Inc., Caterpillar's CEO James Owen commented that the company “did not have the practical ability or legal right to determine how our products are used after they are sold.” This type of head-in-the sand approach by Caterpillar’s CEO ignores its own company’s Code of Worldwide Business Conduct on “it is doing well by doing good around the world” and “that their success should contribute to the quality of life and prosperity of the community. You can read a letter here: http://www.hrw.org/news/2004/11/21/israel-caterpillar-should-suspend-bulldozer-sales

In 2003 the United Nations passed the United Nations Norms on the Responsibilities of Transnational Corporations and Other Business Enterprises with Regard to Human Rights. In this guideline the United Nations have set an obstacle for companies to engage or benefit from violations of human rights or humanitarian law.

In acknowledgement of this resolution,TIAA-CREF, a pension fund giant, has removed Caterpillar, Inc. from its portfolio. In the past shares were estimated at $72,943.861 and today it is an estimated 0. Friends Fiduciary divested $900,000 worth of shares in Caterpillar because they were uncomfortable defending the position of Caterpillar. Both companies have stepped up to their responsibilities to enhance the greater good of the community as a whole and obviously Caterpillar had yet to come to realize with their continued partnership with the Israeli military. The following article verifies that TIAA-CREF no longer sees the advantages in investing in the misery of other people: http://www.commondreams.org/news/2012/06/23/pension-giant-dumps-73-million-caterpillar-stock-over-israel-ties . Also see: http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/06/21/presbyterians-israel-holdings-divestment/11207459/

The Presbyterian Church has taken it a step further by divesting from three companies that are profiting from Israeli policies in occupied Palestine. Boycotting from Motorola, Hewlett Packard and Caterpillar according to representatives from the Presbyterian Church will put pressure on the Israeli government to resolve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-naiman/presbyterians-poised-for-_b_5489103.html

It is up to Earth’s citizens to drive the message to Caterpillar’s CEO James Owen that his company bears the responsibility of the terrible effects the D-9 bulldozers are creating in Palestine. Palestinians are being held hostage to a cycle of despair and hopelessness not due to any natural disaster but due to circumstance created by Israel politicians and their policies, and the companies that profit from them.

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The level of destruction Israel's Caterpillar D-9 bulldozers cause can be seen here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EC6C-cAc240

More analysis on the disadvantages of using home demolitions as a form of collective punishment: http://boycott4peace.blogspot.com/2014/11/collective-punishment.html

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Quick Action!  E-mail Caterpillar, Inc., at: BusinessPractice@cat.com and tell them what you think about their collaboration with the occupation.

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Boycott Caterpillar  Christmas Meme:
http://boycott4peace.blogspot.com/2014/12/boycott-caterpillar.html

Walk Out On the Occupation Cat Boot Meme:
http://boycott4peace.blogspot.com/2015/03/caterpillar-boycott.html

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Boycott for Peace!

http://boycott4peace.blogspot.com/

https://www.facebook.com/boycott4peace
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