Central Valley News - Sacramento, Fresno, & All of Central Valley

On July 24, Israel's Prime Minister came to the US and addressed a joint session of Congress. However, more than a dozen legislators boycotted the speech because they, as do millions gthroughout the world, consider him to be a genocidal war criminal. Throughout Northern California and the US, demonstrations continue to demand Netanyahu's arrest and that the US stop enabling Israel's military as it kills Gazans by the tens of thousands.

As of March 2024, 894,898 acres across the western United States are slated to be logged under a "community protection" measure proposed by the U.S. Forest Service. Resistance is growing. In addition to a lawsuit filed against the agency by a coalition in California, a National Day of Forest-Climate Action will take place on May 28, and the group Lost Sierra Forest Defense is organizing a Climate Action Camp in Plumas County from May 23-29.

Students at UCB, Cal Poly Humboldt, Stanford, Sonoma State, SF State, Sacramento State, USF, UCSC and UCD joined students at colleges throughout the country to establish occupations in support of Palestinians. Outrage at Israel's attempted genocide in Gaza has produced a movement of encampments at Harvard, Columbia, Yale, MIT, NYU, UT Austin, and more. Police have arrested hundreds, and yet the protests persist and expand.

May Day actions this year were organized with urgency in solidarity with the Palestinian people, heeding the call from the Palestinian General Federation of Trade Unions to stand with Gaza. Workers and peoples around the world called for an immediate ceasefire. Marches and rallies filled the streets across Northern California on May 1, and there was no business as usual at the Port of Oakland as officials closed the port in anticipation of planned protests.

Protesters in Northern California have engaged in direct actions aimed at disrupting business as usual and raising the profile of the call to free Palestine. Activists shut down the Bay Bridge. A US military vessel destined to deliver weaponry to Israel was blocked from leaving the Port of Oakland. A defense contractor's office was locked down. Communiqués posted on Indybay claim sabotage of train lines, as well as a water main at a pro-IDF fundraiser.

Millions of people worldwide are standing in solidarity with Palestinians as Israel wages war on Gaza. Marches and rallies have demanded a ceasefire, the end of US military support for Israel, and that Palestine be freed once and for all. Every week there are more protests in cities large and small, including in many that have never seen a pro-Palestinian demonstration. In San Francisco, tens of thousands have marched against Israel's war on Gaza.

At sunrise on October 19, youth climate activists associated with the group Occupy Beale gave a speech decrying the imperialist military-industrial complex, responsible for countless ecological atrocities, energy consumption, and carbon emissions. Four activists, banners in hand, then marched across the demarcation line at the Schneider gate of Beale Air Force Base. Military police detained three of them for over an hour.

On September 16, thousands rallied and marched in Sacramento in solidarity with New York City's massive March to End Fossil Fuels. Starting with colorful rallies in Sacramento's Old Town, protesters marched to the Tower Bridge and displayed a huge banner demanding an end of fossil fuel use. Sign bearing kayakers in the river joined in. Smaller demonstrations happened in Palo Alto and other cities.

On May 19, Governor Newsom announced a legislative package and signed an executive order that would gut the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) to expedite the construction of the Delta Tunnel, Sites Reservoir, and other controversial infrastructure projects, drawing condemnation from environmental groups. On May 25, the California Senate Budget Committee voted to temporarily block the plan, ending the proposal for this legislative year.