The NCALF board has renewed its call for the Fort Collins City Council to approve a Gaza ceasefire resolution, based on the killing of the World Central Kitchen aid workers earlier this month and the response by key national figures in the U.S. We recently sent the following letter to City Council, and ask that people amplify the message. Short e-mails to councilmembers would be helpful, as would public comment at the Council meeting on Tuesday, April 16th. You can write to councilmembers at CityCouncil@fcgov.com. If you are able to speak on April 16th, be sure to register here.
Thank you!
April 15th, 2024
Dear Mayor Arndt and Councilmembers Gutowsky, Pignataro, Canonico, Potyondy, Ohlson, and Francis –
The Northern Colorado Alliance for a Livable Future (NCALF) board renews its call for City Council to approve a Gaza ceasefire resolution. We ask you to reconsider your previous decision not to move forward with such a resolution based on the following facts:
- On April 1st, seven humanitarian aid workers with the charity World Central Kitchen (WCK) who had just delivered food aid to Gazans in Rafah were killed by the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF). The next day WCK founder Jose Andres accused Israel of deliberately targeting the aid team.
- President Biden has since expressed his outrage over this tragedy, and has noted that it is not a “stand-alone incident,” given how many aid workers have been killed by the Israeli military in this conflict to date.
- Former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi has signed a letter to President Biden and Secretary of State Blinken urging a halt in arms transfers to Israel in light of the killing of the WCK aid workers.
More and more national figures are recognizing the egregiousness of the IDF’s behavior in Gaza. It is time for the Fort Collins City council to do likewise and call for an immediate and permanent ceasefire.
As others have pointed out, there is a recent precedent for the Council calling for a ceasefire in a foreign conflict: the resolution it approved on April 5th, 2022 endorsing “any and all actions encouraging a ceasefire” in Ukraine. We note that by many measures, the humanitarian crisis in Gaza is even more severe than the one in Ukraine, both in 2022 and now. In Ukraine, approximately 31,000 soldiers and 11,000 civilians have been killed since the Russian invasion in February of 2022. Those deaths represent 0.1% of Ukraine’s population of 41 million people. In Gaza, over 33,000 people have been killed since the Israeli invasion in October 2023. Those deaths represent 1.4% of Gaza’s population of 2.4 million people, or proportionally 14 times as many as have died in Ukraine. Additionally, the majority of those killed in Gaza have been women and children.
The Fort Collins City Council must reclaim its moral voice by calling for a ceasefire in Gaza. Failing to do so would raise serious questions about how this Council decides which people are worthy of its sympathy.
Finally, we remind this Council that it referred the question of a ceasefire resolution to the Human Relations Commission (HRC) in early February, and that the HRC unanimously recommended that City Council move forward with such a resolution. To date, that recommendation has not even been publicly discussed by Council. This disregard of a City commission’s work sends the wrong message to its members and to other people who either are serving or who might consider serving on a City board or commission in the future. At least discussing the HRC’s recommendation would be an important step toward restoring the public trust that has been lost by Council over this issue.
Once again, we ask you to do what is right by discussing and approving a Gaza ceasefire resolution. The people of Gaza have suffered far too much already. They deserve all the sympathy and support we can offer to them in this, their darkest hour.
Sincerely,
NORTHERN COLORADO ALLIANCE FOR A LIVABLE FUTURE
Kevin Cross
Board Member
Mark Delorey
Board Member, Treasurer
Sally Dowiatt
Board Member
Sue Ellen Klein
Board Member
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