New: A BERKELEY ACTIVIST'S DIARY: Special City Council Meeting on Gaza
The news coming out of Gaza is horrific. Israeli bombing continues even as pictures show a landscape that is already rubble. Starvation sets in as Israel blocks the delivery of food. World Central Kitchen reports their last food delivery in early March.
There are more child amputees in Gaza than anywhere else in the world because Israel has bombed the hospitals and blocked the delivery of the medicines and equipment that in any other setting would be used to save these children’s arms and legs. Physicians, nurses, medics, ambulance drivers are targeted, imprisoned, bombed and killed.
Netanyahu called for the complete annihilation of the Palestinians in his October 28, 2023 speech, but that was not the first time such statements and actions have been taken. The dispossession of Palestinians of their land and erasure of their culture and history started decades ago as Rashid Khalidi writes in The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine: History of Settler Colonialism and Resistance, 1917 – 2017. Khaldi is not alone in chronicling the ethnic cleansing and genocide of Palestinians.
And we, our country, the United States furnishes the bombs, armaments, and financing to Israel for mass murder of Palestinians under the banner of Israel has a right to defend itself.
Twisting the lessons of the Holocaust of “never again” into kill first or be killed has not brought peace. Nor has the nation state of Israel that privileges only Jewish citizens with full rights brought safety.
These recent books lay out for us to question our thinking and actions, One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This by Omar El Akkad, Being Jewish After the Destruction of Gaza: A Reckoning by Peter Beinhart and The World After Gaza: A History by Pankaj Mishra.
It is in this context that the new mayor Adena Ishii scheduled the meeting on April 28, 2025 for the Berkeley City Council to consider the Ceasefire Resolution passed by the Peace and Justice Commission September 30, 2024.
The originally scheduled commission meeting on September 3, 2024 on a ceasefire resolution was cancelled by the City due to a posting error while councilmembers scrambled to remove and replace existing commissioners and fill empty slots with appointees that could be expected to block the passage of a ceasefire resolution.
It was that night September 3 in a quickly assembled rally that I heard Dr. Feroze Sidwa in person for the second time talk about providing medical care as trauma surgeon to the people of Gaza.
I was at that September 30 meeting in the North Berkeley Senior Center packed shoulder to shoulder in standing room only around the full chairs. After an evening of moving public testimony, the ceasefire resolution squeaked by in an 8 to 7 vote.
There really isn’t a good word for how I feel about the outcome of the Berkeley City Council meeting on the Ceasefire Resolution that ends with a resolution that “hopes” for peace and never mentions ceasefire. Days before the meeting started, I stated minds were made up as the members of the council had already picked their sides through their commission appointees and yet when it happened the words I might choose disheartened, depressed, disappointed, sorrowful all seem inadequate.
One person emailed me as being furious. A range of anger doesn’t fit either though I have little patience for those who choose “profound intentional ignorance”.
Another asked why I even care, after all does it even matter what Berkeley does? To that I responded Berkeley has a special place in the mind of the world as a beacon of progressive thinking and action. Of course, Berkeley has failed to live up to that image for quite some time though many still cling to it declaring Berkeley is the only place to live.
We waited seven months to hear the Berkeley City Council weigh in on the resolution passed by the Peace and Justice Commission. When the day arrived, April 28, 2025 there were three resolutions to consider.
- Peace and Justice Commission Resolution with introductory cover letter: bit.ly/3Z4z8U7
- Mayor Adena Ishii and Councilmember Ben Bartlett Resolution: bit.ly/43iqYIX
- Councilmember Terry Taplin Resolution: bit.ly/3S2QNaO
I had planned to attend in person, but when I arrived the gate outside the patio to the B.U.S.D. Board Room the gate was closed, the room was already full. Rather than joining the crowd outside and wait for a chance to get in the room, I turned around and walked home to connect on zoom which is really my preferred way to attend city council.
The meeting started at 5:04 pm with the first speaker at 5:38 pm following a council motion to limit public comment to three hours. At 8:38 pm Councilmember Lunaparra made a motion to add another hour for speakers. In the 7, 1, 1 vote to extend public comment Taplin voted no and Humbert abstained. The rest of the council and mayor voted yes. Public comment continued with the last public speaker finishing at 11:04 pm.
Though 197 speakers are listed in the meeting annotated agenda, through reading the transcript there were an actual 129 speakers. Some people stepped up to the microphone to cede their one minute while others just raised their hand to give a speaker extra time to reach the maximum four-minute limit.
The public who wrote and spoke against passing the Peace and Justice Commission Resolution (PJC) and pushed a vote to reject everything or to pass the Taplin resolution would like us to believe they were in the majority.
Speaker 23 identifying as a parent of a B.U.S.D (Berkeley Unified School District) student went so far as to use the Republican trope that people were bused in and calling in from out of state to account for the full room and line of callers on zoom.
In my walk over, I didn’t see any of the buses that speaker 23 claimed were used to deliver out of area “anti-Semites” to the meeting. What I did see in the crowd were many familiar local faces. There might have been a few who took the local AC Transit bus, but as much as Berkeley and climate activists are trying to increase public transit ridership, most of us walk, bicycle, scooter or drive.
Maybe it was the two out of towners from Richmond, California that caught Speaker 23’s attention, current Mayor Eduardo Martinez (speaker 31) and former Richmond Mayor Gayle McLaughlin (speaker 57). They spoke to the City of Richmond passing the first ceasefire resolution in the nation on October 24, 2023, a resolution McLaughlin stated she co-authored.
Or maybe 23 was anticipating Dr. Feroze Sidwa speaker 88 the humanitarian trauma and critical care surgeon from Stockton, California who has worked extensively in Palestine and also Ukraine, Haiti, Zimbabwe and Burkina Faso. Dr. Sidwa is the kind of person who gives his medical skills courageously and was able to provide firsthand accounts in his zoom call at 9:30 pm as a trauma surgeon in Gaza. https://www.ferozesidhwa.org/
Ninety-five people spoke in support of PJC with many emphasizing an arms embargo. Thirty spoke against the PJC with a mix of supporting the Taplin resolution or requesting no action. There were four who spoke with no decipherable recommendation.
I read all the communication letters using the dates from April 24 the date the meeting was posted through April 28, the three resolutions and then studied it all again.
There were some who sent more than one email. Only one person wrote in support of the resolution by Mayor Ishii and Councilmember Bartlett. Fifty-four emails requested no action and fifty-two emails supported the Taplin resolution. Ninety-eight emails with a total of 289 listed signers supported the Peace and Justice Ceasefire Resolution.
The organizations supporting PJC were the Friends of Adeline, Berkeley Fellowship of Unitarian Universalists, UC Nikkei Student Union, Japanese American Community and Japanese American Families for Justice. Several letters were from members of SEIU 1021 whose Executive Board voted for a ceasefire on November 6, 2023.
Maybe speaker 23 was confused by hearing from Jewish Voice for Peace thinking that speaker was from out of state. Jewish Voice for Peace was originally organized right here in Berkeley and speaker 9 representing Jewish Voice for Peace is my neighbor in the Berkeley flats.
The Jewish Coalition of Berkeley supported the Taplin Resolution.
Of the many letters it was Tarek Milleron’s numbered 154 that I went back to, to reread again.
Milleron started with a quote from the op-ed by Daniel Blatman that appeared in Haaretz on April 28, 2025, “I have been engaged in researching the Holocaust for about 40 years. I have read countless testimonies about the worst genocide against the Jewish people and other victims. I had never imagined in my most horrific nightmares the reality in which I would read testimonies about mass murder carried out by the Jewish state, which in their chilling resemblance remind me of testimonies in the Yad Vashem archives.”
Jonathan Mintzer speaker 43 from the Jewish Community Relations Council (JCRC) requested that council avoid adopting any resolution. Mintzer stated that JCRC represented seventy synagogues in the region with five in Berkeley.
JCRC is the organization that sponsors Bay Area Israel seminars with trips to Israel for “rising stars in government and civic leadership” with such notable former seminar travelers as Governor Newsom, VP Kamala Harris and San Francisco former mayor London Breed. https://jcrc.org/blog/israel-seminars/
The sponsored trips to Israel appear to have been a good investment for Israel. Harris denied to grant a speaking spot for Palestinian American at the Democratic Convention in August 2024. We know how that turned out for us as pro-Palestinian activists pulled their endorsements.
Locals Jesse Arreguin (May 2022), Jenny Wong (March 2023) and Sophie Hahn (March 2023) were also travelers on JCRC seminar trips to Israel though Hahn paid her own way.
The ceasefire resolution never made it onto the city council agenda while Arreguin and Hahn sat on the three-member Council Agenda Committee.
When public comment ended each councilmember spoke.
Humbert was the first to speak (over many interruptions) stating his opposition to the Peace and Justice Commission Resolution and his support for Taplin’s resolution which focused on Berkeley.
Blackaby followed with thanking everyone, being moved by the comments and ending with supporting the Taplin resolution.
O’Keefe read from her prepared comments that when she was in high school she was confused and bothered by Berkeley weighing in on international affairs and that Berkeley should focus on local affairs and she would be supporting the Taplin resolution.
Taplin thanked the Jewish community and others in his district and called “these symbolic international resolutions, “at best and worst a wasteful distraction” triggering trauma and that six hours of vitriol failed to convince him otherwise. He went on with, “no one is going to threaten or force me into regurgitating language on command in pursuit of a political agenda that has nothing to do with local governance”.
Taplin’s tone and comments struck me as sounding angry and like a bully.
Tregub spoke to being a Jewish immigrant from Ukraine, being deeply moved and saying that no resolution is perfect. Tregub stated support to both the mayor’s and Taplin’s resolutions.
Lunaparra in reading her prepared statement challenged the sentiment that this issue is outside the purview of Berkeley by citing our tax dollars fund the genocide, that we cannot distance ourselves from the consequences, that inaction fans the flames of hatred and resentment, that Jewish and Palestinian constituents have been pleading for action, that Berkeley City Council voted unanimously in June 2022 (Taplin was elected in 2020) for a resolution calling for a ceasefire in Ukraine, that failure to act has led to a fractured community and that even though our fascist federal government will not change, the purpose of the resolution is to show the community and our neighbors we are standing up for what is right.
Lunaparra closed with reading the letter calling for a ceasefire from the father of hostage Nimrod Cohen.
Kesarwani spoke to acknowledging the profound suffering in Gaza, unimaginable loss, shattered dreams, the fundamental right to safety and security cruelly denied, deep seeded fears of the Israelis and her support for both the mayor’s and Taplin’s resolutions.
Then the meeting moved to a back and forth between Taplin and Ishii with neither wanting to make the first move for a motion. Ishii called for a five-minute recess. On return Lunaparra moved Taplin’s resolution for the purpose of discussion which made it the main motion. Ishii then made a motion for her resolution which would make it the substitute motion. The substitute motion is always voted on first.
Taplin picked up commenting again at 11:39 pm this time to rewrite the mayor’s resolution by inserting expansive language that he had not included in his own resolution, an action that contradicted his earlier comments that engaging in a resolution was a wasteful distraction.
Ishii declined the amendments saying it was too much to consider from the dais.
Kesarwani said she supported the amendments in that they made it a stronger resolution.
Again, Ishii declined.
The vote was called for the mayor’s resolution. It lost. Bartlett, Tregub, Lunaparra and Ishii voted yes. Blackaby voted no. Kesarwani who had previously stated support abstained along with Taplin, O’Keefe, and Humbert.
The vote then went to the main motion Taplin’s resolution. It passed in a 7,1,1 vote. Mayor Ishii and councilmembers Kesarwani, Taplin, Tregub, O’Keefe, Blackaby, and Humbert voted for it. Councilmember Lunaparra voted no and Councilmember Bartlett abstained.
I heard some day after quarterbacking that Ishii should have allowed discussion of the Taplin amendments to hold the five votes. With only 16 minutes left extending the meeting past midnight to complete a discussion would have been a very hard sell. Would it have worked? I’m not so sure. Or was Taplin’s tactic to run the clock and fill JCRC’s request to leave with nothing?
Taplin’s Resolution: “Reaffirming Berkeley’s Commitment to Peace, at Home and Abroad”
WHEREAS, the City of Berkeley sees all human life as precious and recognizes the importance of peace and security for all communities in our city, our state, our nation, and our world, regardless of national, ethnic, or religious affiliations; and
WHEREAS, members of the Berkeley community have been deeply affected by the suffering and loss of innocent life resulting from the ongoing war in Israel, Gaza, and Lebanon, with many carrying direct ties to the conflict, driving fear for loved ones and profound personal losses; and
WHEREAS, this conflict abroad is driving hate at home, and the City Council has heard from individual Berkeley residents and groups who have been targeted, insulted, and threatened, and who fear for their family’s safety, sense of belonging, and well-being here in Berkeley and in Berkeley schools; and
WHEREAS, Berkeley Police Department’s 2023 and 2024 Annual Reports showed a local spike in hate following October 7th, 2023, including significant increases in the rate of anti-Jewish hate crimes and hate incidents, and an increase in anti-Arab and anti-Muslim hate crimes; and
WHEREAS, Berkeley has long been a bastion of tolerance and a beacon of hope and acceptance for people of all backgrounds, and these hateful incidents run counter to our community’s values; and
WHEREAS, the City Council of Berkeley acknowledges that residents of Berkeley have strong and often divergent opinions about the war in the Middle East and U.S. foreign policy; and
WHEREAS, it is the responsibility of the Berkeley City Council and elected officials to combat hate and provide moral leadership in our city;
NOW, THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, that the Berkeley City Council and the Mayor of Berkeley grieve the terrible loss of life and empathize with community members whose families are impacted by the conflict and share their hope for a just and enduring peace that allows Israelis, Palestinians, and all residents of the region to live side-by-side with dignity, security, human rights, civil rights, and self-determination; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the City of Berkeley values its Arab, Israeli, Jewish, Muslim and Palestinian residents and condemns the rise of anti-Jewish and anti-Muslim hate locally and across the country; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the City of Berkeley reaffirms its commitment to being a safe and welcoming place for people of all backgrounds, religions, and ethnicities, and pledges to work with community leaders and first responders to keep every member of our community safe.
In the April 24 Activist’s Diary on the Ceasefire Resolution I wrote I would be attending the conversation between Rabbi David Cooper and Peter Beinhart on Beinhart’s new book Being Jewish after the Destruction of Gaza: A Reckoning.
Rabbi Cooper was deeply familiar with Beinhart’s work and early on went straight to asking Beinhart how he had changed from his earlier writing to this latest book. The conversation was much different than I expected. https://youtu.be/H1aNrLLO2fQ
