Hear full interview | SoundOnSight Podcast on Spotify and Apple:
SoundOnSight IS A NEW PODCAST INITIATIVE BY ACoM. CHECK OUT MORE EPISODES HERE.
OAKLAND, Calif. — Activists and labor unions in Oakland are escalating demands for local officials to end the shipment of cargo bound for Israel, saying they are willing to call for a general strike and walk off the job if demands are not met.
A report released last month by the Palestinian Youth Movement claims Oakland Airport is the second largest air shipper of military cargo to Israel in the US. They found at least 280 shipments of military cargo moved through the Oakland Airport and Port of Oakland in September, which appear to include F-35 fighter jet parts. Almost all shipments were destined for Israel’s Nevatim Air Base, where the country houses its F-35s.
Several organizations and local labor unions have joined the embargo demand since the report’s release, under the banner “Oakland People’s Arms Embargo”. Recently, the Alameda Labor Council voted unanimously to back the demands.
On Nov. 18, activists with SEIU 1021, ILWU Local 10, IFPTE Local 21, and other unions demonstrated outside the Oakland Airport with the Palestinian Youth Movement.
“A lot of our resources in the US need to stay in the US…there are communities here that are suffering,” said Oakland resident Dina with the Palestinian Youth Movement. “In Oakland, with our tax dollars, we could repair the roads, make our communities safer, we could thrive, but that money is instead going to decimating other communities.”
Many of the demonstrators ACoM spoke to referenced ILWU Local 10’s successful efforts to boycott cargo to apartheid South Africa as the historical precedent for their activism. Their 11 day refusal to touch South African cargo in 1984 marked an inflection point in the US labor movement’s stance against apartheid.
“The sentiment that we’re getting from the players involved is they’re powerless to do anything, which we know is not true because during apartheid South Africa, the port commission actually stopped sending goods to South Africa, which set off a chain of events that then led to Oakland and then the rest of the country not sending goods to South Africa…” said Dina.
“We know that not only is it possible, but it’s been done. History shows us that when Oakland picks up a movement, the rest of the country follows. So we’re simply asking the port to go back to their roots, to go back to what they’ve done in the past and lead with moral clarity. We don’t think it’s a difficult ask because they’ve done it before.”
Oakland native Rosita is a nurse with the California Nurses Association, another union that endorsed the arms embargo. She is heavily involved in activism for Palestine; she was arrested on the Golden Gate Bridge for a demonstration last April.
She says the genocide in Gaza has “etched its way into every single facet of life.”
“From work to coffee shops, wherever we go, this is part of everyday conversation because it’s horrific what we’ve seen. If we turn a blind eye to it and we sit idly by and decide to become complicit and not have the conversations, then what does that say about us? What does that say about our moral character, our principles?”
The arms embargo demands come as the UN Security Council just voted to approve a US backed plan for Gaza’s future, which details a “temporary international force” and a “transitional administration” for Gaza’s reconstruction. Critics denounce the plan as a denial of Palestinian self-determination, as no formal Palestinian leadership was invited to the process, and a further hindrance to a fully formed Palestinian state.
“What that means is an indefinite colonization of Gaza in perpetuity. Israel, the world, cannot do that without the continuing harming of Palestinians and murder and maiming and starvation,” says Jeffery Dix from Oakland, as he demonstrated outside the airport. “They do that with weapons made here in the United States, sold and given to them by our government.”
Nix is on the board of SEIU 1021 in Oakland, which represents service workers like those at the port and airport.
“Labor overwhelmingly says boycott, divest, and sanction Israel, and arms embargos are one of the strongest ways we can do that. We can withhold our labor, put our bodies on the gears of imperialism, and actually use our bodies to stop that material transfer of military cargo to Israel.”
Nix points out that using their bodies, as in, walking off the job, has been one of the most successful parts of organized labor’s strategy. The “Block the Boat” campaigns, which started in 2014 to disrupt ships suspected of heading to Israel, are the most explicit example of this. In 2024, ILWU 10 refused to unload an Israeli ship docked in Oakland in solidarity with demonstrators, joining the picket line.
“Weapons that day were not sent to Israel, and we can do the same here again at the Port of Oakland. Importantly, labor solidarity is not just a raise at the worksite, its international solidarity with workers of the world. In 1021, we developed a relationship with the Palestine New Federation of Trade Unions. We always ask what we can do, they say ‘continue the fight for BDS.’”
Nix says the current focus is on the Port Commission, who they are pressuring to adopt a resolution supporting the arms embargo.
“We need legislation, we need policy, to follow up on the very clear public will and sentiment of Alameda County and Oakland residents.”
Kaley Skantz, the airport’s public information officer, told ACoM that OAK is “legally required to accommodate federally authorized air traffic, including air cargo arranged by the U.S. government and/or private air cargo providers, including FedEx.”
“FedEx has a long-term ground lease with the Port of Oakland and is the largest air cargo carrier operating at the airport,” Skantz added. “All of FedEx’s flight and loading operations are carried out by FedEx employees directly in areas that FedEx exclusively controls. Due to federal laws and FAA regulations that govern all airports in the United States, OAK does not control access to cargo manifests or the shipping activity of its carriers.”
She added that last Tuesday’s demonstration was peaceful and had no significant impact on airport operations.
On Thursday, 20 November, the Oakland Peoples Arms Embargo coalition presented their preliminary resolution to the Port Commission. The overall demands are for the board to condemn the military cargo shipments to Israel, and to commit to taking concrete steps to stop those shipments from flying out of OAK. The coalition plans to work with the Commission to form an actionable plan.
Nix adds that if the Commission does not adopt their resolution, or work with them on an actionable pathway to divestment, they will escalate their tactics.
“We’re always looking at the possibility of a general strike. That’s something that seemed impossible in the United States a couple of years ago, but now we see UAW call for a general strike, we see firefighters and teachers calling for one in Los Angeles…it’s not something that’s impossible anymore in the United States.”
Chris Alam is a California Local News Fellow with the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism.
