Ethics Newsline®

SEATTLE
The family of a U.S. activist killed by Israeli forces while she was trying to block the demolition of a Palestinian home filed suit last week against Caterpillar, accusing the company of exporting specially armored bulldozers that the company knew would endanger people.

U.S. student Rachel Corrie was killed in March 2003 by Israeli Defense Forces who ran over her twice with a bulldozer while demolishing a Palestinian home in Gaza, reported the Associated Press.

While an Israeli investigation ruled her death to be an accident, fellow protestors say the bulldozer’s driver could not have missed Corrie as she knelt in front of the Palestinian home wearing a fluorescent orange jacket.

Last week, Corrie’s family sued industrial equipment maker Caterpillar, accusing the company of violating U.S. and international law by providing Israel with specially armored bulldozers it knew would be used to “demolish homes and endanger civilians,” reported Australia’s Sydney Morning Herald.

Caterpillar last week declined to comment on the suit, but released a statement saying that “more than 2 million Caterpillar machines and engines are at work in virtually every region of the world each day. We have neither the legal right nor the means to police individual use of that equipment.”