This is crazy. How can the LA City Council even consider a resolution focusing on Hamas instead of the crimes committed by the Israeli government that killed over 2,000 Palestinians?? We hear it said that Gaza is an open-air prison, but prisoners get at least minimal food, security and heathcare. We must stand against this resolution and let the City Council know this would be a racist and violent move.

Join us this Friday, August 15th at 8:15 AM – At Los Angeles City Hall Main Steps.

The Intergovernmental Relations Committee of the Los Angeles City Council is set to meet on Friday, August 15 at 9AM to consider an outrageous resolution that condemns Hamas and fails to mention Israeli war crimes. The resolution turns reality on its head by implying that Israel is the victim, when in fact it is the engaged in brutal occupation, mass killing of civilians and scores of war crimes. The resolution is an attempt to obscure the truth.

This announcement was sent out as an email and does not yet appear on the Codepink website yet, but the LA City Council, apparently with nothing better to do in the taxpayer dollar than suck up to Israel, is considering a resolution that would drop the blame for 5 weeks of Israel's attacks on Gaza squarely on HAMAS.

Codepink is mobilizing a protest. I know there are a lot of protests going on, and maybe that is a good thing, but this is one you should make a point of getting to if you live in the Los Angeles area. If my wife and I still lived in North Hollywood, we would be heading down to this one ourselves!

Let's review the timetable.

In June, three Israeli teenagers were kidnapped and killed in an IDF-controlled region of the West Bank, not Gaza. ISIS has taken credit and even the Israeli media admits that the two suspects named by the Israeli government are not part of HAMAS, but of a group known for disobeying HAMAS and trying to cause trouble for them.

But Netanyahu declared HAMAS, the legally elected government of Gaza, responsible and launched bombing raids into Gaza using the very latest high-tech weapons provided by the US Government and paid for by the US taxpayers.

To put Israel's actions into perspective, let us recall that over the July 4th weekend, 8 people were killed in Chicago. Using Netanyahu's logic, the Democratic party should be blamed and all of Illinois bombed and invaded!

The Gazans, who were attacked without provocation, fought back with their home-made rockets, which so far have mostly knocked a few roof tiles loose.

But to Israel's supporters, we should all forget that Israel attacked Gaza without a valid reason, and view Gaza's attempts to defend themselves as the crime, so that Israel can go on pounding the Palestinians with their superior weapons.

I want to point something out. The Israelis sit in their tanks, or the drone operations centers, or fly high above Gaza in their US-supplied warplanes, dropping the latest in US-supplied high tech lethal munitions, and imagine themselves the heroes they read about in the Torah. The Israelis, clearly unafraid of HAMAS rockets, line the hills overlooking Gaza and cheer the carnage, much as the Romans at the Colosseum cheered as the Christians were thrown to the lions. The Gazans huddle in their giant open-air prison, without an army, a navy, or an air force, and fight back with home-made rockets made out of plumbing supplies.

Not since Thermopylae has the world seen such courage in the face of overwhelming odds. The Gazans have balls the US and Israel can only dream of, and the world will remember their courage against the tyrants, and the lies by the corporate media's presstitutes and whorespondents trying to protect Israel's aggression, right alongside the Los Angeles City Council!

rremelin@gmail.com