On September 22, 2025 Representative Delia Ramirez (IL-03) introduced the Block the Bombs Act during the 119th Congress.
“This bill prohibits the President from selling, transferring, or exporting some of the most destructive weapon systems — specifically bunker-buster bombs, JDAMs, 120mm tank rounds, and 155mm artillery shells — to Israel, which are currently being used in the destruction of Gaza.”
On September 24, Bay Area poets, with scores of other protestors, gathered outside the offices of California Senators Padilla and Schiff at Post and Market Streets in San Francisco. The poets, standing together in front of the crowd, included San Francisco Poet Laureate Genny Lim, former San Francisco Poets Laureate Emeritus Alexandro Murguia and Devorah Major, as well as Mike Wong, Joe Lamb, James Janko, Maxine Hong Kingston, Salma Shaie, Kathleen Herman, Alameda Poet Laureate Kimi Sugioka, and Kirk Lumpkin.
Brightly-painted streetcars packed with commuters rumbled past on Market Street. On the crowded sidewalk, passersby stopped to listen. The poets demanded Senators Padilla and Schiff take action to support the Block the Bombs legislation. Most US Senators voted for it recently and it has 50 Congressional co-sponsors.
Reading poem after powerful poem, the poets also called for protection of Palestinian journalists who have been deliberately targeted and killed in the Gaza Strip, crimes committed by Israel with impunity.
In the shadowed canyon of Market Street, outlined against the late afternoon sky, it seemed as if kites flew above the poets and the crowd. They were protest signs created by artist David Solnit, and they quoted Palestinian writer, poet, professor and activist Refaat Alareer, who was targeted and killed on December 6, 2023, by an Israeli airstrike in northern Gaza. Here is Alareer’s poem, its opening and closing lines sketched across the kite signs: IF I MUST DIE
If
I must die
you
must live
to
tell my story
to
sell my things
to
buy a piece of cloth
and
some strings
(make
it white with a long tail)
so
that a child, somewhere in Gaza
while
looking heaven in the eye
awaiting
his dad who left in a blaze
and
bid no one farewell
not
even to his flesh
not
even to himself—
sees
the kite, my kite you made, flying up above
and
thinks for a moment an angel is there
bringing
back love
If
I must die
let
it bring hope
let
it be a tale
For more information about the Block the Bombs Act, and to make your voice heard, check out the website: https://www.blockthebombs.org
