There is no reason to be quiet over the function of business connected to Israel’s unlawful actions in the inhabited Palestinian area and its war in Gaza.
Head of Responsible Investments, KLP
Published On 26 Jun 2024
At Norway’s biggest personal pension fund, KLP, we have chose to divest from United States commercial group Caterpillar over issues about its function in human rights abuses in inhabited Palestine.
KLP has formerly divested from business connected to the prohibited Israeli settlements and the separation wall in the West Bank following the essential United Nations report on companies connected to settlements.
Caterpillar’s D9 series bulldozers are imported to Israel by Israeli Tractors and Equipment (ITE), part of Zoko Enterprises. In collaboration with the Israeli military’s Technology and Maintenance Corps, Zoko Enterprises has rebuilt these devices with vehicle-mounted weapons and armoured motorists’ cabins for usage in the inhabited Palestinian area. The extensively utilized Caterpillar D9R bulldozers weigh around 62 tonnes, are 4 metres high and large, and 8 metres long.
The continuous usage of these weaponised bulldozers in the inhabited Palestinian area has led to a series of human rights cautions from United Nations companies, and nongovernmental organisations over the last 2 years about the business’s participation in the demolition of Palestinian homes and facilities.
On June 20, UN human rights professionals called on Caterpillar and weapons business like BAE Systems to rightaway stop the transfer of weapons and other military devices to Israel as they might makeup major offenses of human rights and worldwide humanitarian laws, runningtheriskof complicity in worldwide criminaloffenses, perhaps consistingof genocide. This need is in line with current calls from the Human Rights Council and the independent UN specialists to states to stop sendingout military devices to Israel even if performed under existing export licences.
Around 100 Caterpillar D9R bulldozers were reported to be utilized in Gaza at the start of the newest war, after October 7. In December 2023, th