FOR IMMEDIATE
RELEASE

Portland Takes First Step Towards Becoming Occupation Free
Portland Human Rights Commission endorses
placing companies on a “Do Not Buy” List for human rights abuses in
Israel/Palestine

Portland,
Oregon – October 12, 2015– Occupation-Free
Portland Coalition congratulates the Portland Human Rights Commission (HRC) for
their unanimous endorsement of the coalition’s proposal to the City Of Portland
Socially Responsible Investments (SRI) Committee to place four companies on the
City’s “Do Not Buy List” due to their serious human rights violations in the
ongoing illegal and brutal Israeli occupation of Palestinian land. The
companies are Caterpillar, Hewlett-Packard, G4S, and Motorola Solutions.

The proposal was brought to the HRC by Occupation-Free
Portland, a coalition of religious, social justice and human rights groups
working for justice for Palestine. The coalition stated: “We applaud the
Portland HRC for this action. This endorsement demonstrates that the HRC
continues to be a “moral compass” for human rights in our community. They
understand that diverse struggles for human rights and dignity are connected
and deserve our local attention and commitment to change.”

Occupation-Free
Portland is working to encourage city officials to align our municipal
investments with values of human rights. Portland’s City Council recently
adopted a Socially Responsible Investment policy that establishes “social and values principles”
for consideration in the City’s investments. One of the principles in the City’s
SRI policy is “concerns about impacts on human rights”. If a company is determined to be committing serious human rights violations, citizens
can propose that the city’s SRI Committee recommend to the City Council to move
our investments out of that company. If no current investment exists, the City
would then commit to not make a future investment in that company until they
amend their ways. In doing this, the companies who are profiting from abusive
practices will see that their practices are not acceptable to people of good
conscience. Occupation-Free Portland’s focus on these four companies’
violations of Palestinian human rights is consistent with Portland’s SRI criteria.

Ned Rosch of Jewish Voice for Peace – Portland
said “This is a moral first step
towards ending the City of Portland’s complicity with human rights violations
and holding corporations accountable for supporting Israel’s illegal
occupation.”

Occupation-Free Portland will continue to
educate the public about the Israeli occupation of Palestinian land and will
take our proposal to the City of Portland SRI Committee to advocate for the
City to take this moral stand.

Roles of each of these 4 companies in the
Israeli occupation of Palestine:

Caterpillar sells specially manufactured bulldozers
(D9 bulldozers) to the Israeli military.
They are equipped with armor and weapons and are used to demolish Palestinian
homes, entire villages and agricultural land. These bulldozers are weapons of
warfare. Many of us who live in the Pacific Northwest remember that a
Caterpillar bulldozer killed an Evergreen University student, Rachel Corrie,
when she attempted to stop a home demolition in occupied Gaza.

G4S is a global private security firm. In
Israel, they provide security services and equipment in prisons where
Palestinians are jailed and often tortured. Palestinian prisoners are
frequently held in “Administrative Detention” (meaning they have not been
charged with a crime, have not had a trial, and are often denied legal
representation). Since the year 2000, Defense of Children International reports
that over 8000 Palestinian children have been held in Israeli jails. G4S is an
integral part of that jail system.

Hewlett-Packard—provides identification systems that
differentiate by religion and ethnicity between Palestinians and Jewish
Israelis. Palestinians are restricted in their movement by their IDs and by H-P
monitors at military checkpoints—often preventing them from working, going to
school or seeing family members. Like the racist passbooks in Apartheid South
Africa, these IDs have a harmful impact on Palestinian life and economic well-being.

Motorola
Solutions is profiting
from the occupation through providing communication systems to the Israeli
military and electronic surveillance systems to the Israeli settlements that
are illegally built on Palestinian land.

Occupation-Free
Portland is a coalition of groups working for justice for Palestine. Groups in
the coalition include Jewish Voice for Peace-Portland Chapter; Friends of
Sabeel-North America; Lutherans for Justice in the Holy Land; the Wider Church
Ministry of the Central Pacific Conference, United Church of Christ; Portland
Fellowship of Reconciliation; Students United for Palestinian Equal Rights;
Veterans for Peace, Chapter 72; Americans United for Palestinian Human Rights;
and the International Socialist Organization.

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