Mark MacKinnon wants to equate the Palestinian bulldozer terrorists with Israeli bulldozers. The Globe & Mail reporter fails to take into account that Israel bulldozes structures, not people.
Lost in the understandable hysteria was the tragic irony and thick symbolism of construction equipment being used by Palestinians to inflict harm on Israelis. Though few would dare say it last week for fear of being seen as justifying the attacks, the truth is that the bulldozer has long been an Israeli weapon of choice in this uneven conflict. And the two Palestinian attackers had experienced first-hand the violence a bulldozer can inflict before using the tool as a weapon themselves.
Bulldozers have long been associated with the harsher side of Israel’s 41-year-old occupation of the Palestinian Territories. In the past eight years alone, they’ve been used to destroy more than 2,300 Palestinian homes, uproot orchards of olive trees and construct the controversial 723-kilometre-long barrier that weaves through the West Bank, effectively annexing large chunks of land to Israel. American peace activist Rachel Corrie was famously crushed under an Israeli army bulldozer in the Gaza Strip as she sat in front of a Palestinian home in 2003, trying to prevent its demolition.
Memo to MacKinnon: Rachel Corrie’s death was an accident.
