For hours Saturday in San Francisco, hundreds of people took to the streets for hours, once again urging for a ceasefire in Gaza. Organizers say that at the peak of this demonstration, there were 1,500 people present.
People chanted, beat drums, carried signs, waved the flag of Palestine, and marched near San Francisco's City Hall. Many demonstrators expressed their anger and worry as the strikes on Gaza resumed after the collapse of a temporary truce.
"Our demands are for a permanent ceasefire immediately, and for the siege on Gaza to be lifted, and for U.S. aid to Israel to end," said Suzanne Ali, with the Palestinian Youth Movement Bay Area Chapter.
Ali is a Palestinian American and a San Francisco resident. She has cousins, aunts, and uncles living in southern Gaza, in Khan Younis.
"Their neighbor, just yesterday, was just killed in one of the bombings," Ali explained. "Especially in Khan Younis right now, it looks like something out of hell."
After a week-long truce between Israel and Hamas collapsed, Israel resumed its attacks on the Gaza Strip Friday. Since the truce ended, Israel has launched airstrikes in the south of Gaza, the very area it told Palestinians to evacuate to. NBC News reports these airstrikes destroyed residential buildings on the outskirts of Khan Younis. On Friday, people living in Khan Younis reported that Israel dropped leaflets in their area telling them to relocate to the southern city of Rafah along the border with Egypt.
Ali said that her family in Khan Younis is struggling to find food, water, and fuel.
"They have told us since before the truce -- well before the truce -- hearing the bombs falling, they already know they’re going to die, they expect to die," Ali said.
"And that is not normal, it should not be normal," she continued.
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Ali said she is hopeful about a resolution calling for a ceasefire expected to go before the San Francisco Board of Supervisors this coming week.
City leaders in Oakland and Richmond have already passed similar resolutions.
In an interview with NBC Bay Area on Friday, Tyler Gregory, the CEO of the Jewish Community Relations Council of the Bay Area (JCRC) said he is worried these resolutions are stoking divisions.
"We really think that our local city governments should be working on local issues, and not pretending to be a foreign policy body," Gregory said.
However, Jewish Bay Area residents at Saturday's demonstration in San Francisco made it clear: JCRC does not speak for them. These Jewish community members said they support a ceasefire resolution in San Francisco.
"We are hoping that our elected officials will listen to our calls, to the tens of thousands of Jewish people in solidarity with Palestine, and demand a ceasefire now," said Ariel Korem of San Francisco.
Regarding the expected ceasefire resolution in San Francisco, Seth Morrison of El Cerrito said, "we are looking forward to them passing it, and we will be out here en masse to ensure that they do."
Palestinian authorities say since the war began, more than 15,000 people in Gaza have been killed, including more than 5,000 children.
After these latest strikes, those numbers continue to rise.
Many demonstrators in San Francisco say they plan to continue showing up to demonstrations like this in the Bay Area.
"We come out here every day because we are fighting against the normalization of the brutality against our people," said Ali.
