California City Calls for Permanent Ceasefire in Gaza, Urgent Humanitarian Aid to Besieged Strip

By Staff, Agencies

Oakland’s City Council on Monday passed a carefully crafted resolution calling for a ceasefire in the ‘Israeli’ war on Gaza after hours of hearing impassioned rhetoric about the martyrdom of thousands of civilians in Gaza.

The council in the California Bay Area city voted 8-0 in favor of a motion supporting a congressional resolution for a permanent ceasefire, along with the unrestricted entry of humanitarian assistance into Gaza and a restoration of basic services, as well as “respect for international law” and the release of all captives and detainees.

A temporary ceasefire between the Zionist regime and Palestinian resistance movement Hamas, which Qatar helped broker, is currently in place.

US cities have been adopting resolutions regarding the aggression even though they have no legal role or formal say in the process, said David Glazier, who teaches constitutional law at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles.

Cities across the United States have increasingly been speaking up on matters that have long been relegated to diplomatic spheres, even working with local elected leaders abroad on what has been coined city-to-city diplomacy to tackle everything from housing refugees and asylum seekers to dealing with climate change.

The ‘Israeli’ war on Gaza started on October 7 after the Palestinian resistance launched surprise Operation Al-Aqsa Flood in the ‘Israeli’-occupied Palestinian territories in response to the decades-long ‘Israeli’ occupation atrocities against the Palestinian landowners.

Since the start of the aggression, the ‘Tel Aviv’ regime has killed over 15,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, and left vast swathes of the coastal enclave in ruins. An additional 7,000 Palestinians are missing and believed to be under rubble.

‘Israel’ has also imposed a “complete siege” on the territory, cutting off fuel, electricity, food and water to the more than two million Palestinians living there.