Mayor Justin Bibb declines to sign City Council resolution calling for ceasefire in Gaza
Mayor Justin Bibb returned the unsigned resolution calling for ceasefire in Gaza to City Council on Wednesday, council says. Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb declined to sign a resolution passed by City Council that calls for a ceasefire in Gaza. The resolution was unanimously passed after 17 weeks of protests from Palestinian supporters. If Bibb had vetoed it, council could override his veto with a two-thirds majority vote. The council resolution, which does not formally endorse a ceasefire or hostage release, broadly condemns Islamophobia and antisemitism, as well as Hamas’s Oct. 7 terrorist attack and kidnapping of Israeli civilians. The Jewish Federation of Cleveland called the resolution “hurtful” and accused City Council of giving credence to the hateful rhetoric aimed at the Jewish community.
Published : 4 weeks ago by castolfi, Courtney Astolfi | [email protected], Courtney Astolfi in Politics
CLEVELAND, Ohio – Mayor Justin Bibb opted not to sign a resolution passed by City Council that calls for a ceasefire in Gaza, a council spokesman said.
Bibb returned the unsigned resolution to council staff on Wednesday morning, but did not include the reasons behind his objections, the spokesman said.
cleveland.com has reached out to Bibb’s team to learn why he declined to sign it.
Due to charter-imposed time limits, Bibb had until Thursday to exercise one of three options on council’s resolution: sign it, decline to sign it, or veto it, according to a council attorney.
By declining to sign it, the resolution formally went into effect Wednesday, the attorney said. Had Bibb vetoed it, he would’ve been required to explain his objections to the resolution. Council could’ve overridden the veto with a two-thirds majority vote.
City Council passed the resolution unanimously during its March 25 meeting, after 17 weeks of protests from dozens, and at times, hundreds, of Palestine supporters during the public comment period of council’s weekly meetings.
While council resolutions carry no formal weight, they do serve as a strong statement from Cleveland’s elected officials.
Between October and March, City Council had resisted calls to pass such a resolution. Council President Blaine Griffin had said the body would only move forward with one if local Jewish and Palestinian advocacy groups came up with language that both sides could agree on.
But City Council changed its stance last week after the U.S. declined to veto a United Nations Security Council resolution calling for a ceasefire in Gaza. Hours after the U.N. passed its resolution on March 25, council introduced and passed its own resolution.
The text of City Council’s resolution broadly condemns Islamophobia and antisemitism, as well as Hamas’ Oct. 7 terrorist attack and kidnapping of Israeli civilians.
It says “Council and Clevelanders of all faiths and backgrounds have expressed profound concern for the innocent civilians suffering and are alarmed by the loss of tens of thousands of innocent Palestinian and American lives due to the war in Gaza.”
And while it does not explicitly call for a ceasefire or hostage release, it does state that City Council “supports all efforts to resolve the tragic conflict in Gaza” and “further supports the Resolution adopted by the UN Security Council that calls for a halt to the fighting in Gaza and for the release of all hostages taken captive on October 7th.”
After council’s vote last week, the Ohio chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations said it “welcomed” the passage of the resolution, calling it a “historical moment and a testament to the people of Cleveland’s will and determination to speak out against injustice and inhumanity.”
CAIR also credited local activists for their advocacy at recent council meetings, which included members of Jewish Voice for Peace, Fifth Christian Church, Party for Socialism and Liberation, Young Latinos Network, Palestinian Youth Movement, U.S. Palestinian Community Network, Palestinian Existence for Peace Society, OPAWL, Democratic Socialists of America and the Interreligious Task Force on South America.
The Jewish Federation of Cleveland, meanwhile, called council’s resolution “hurtful.”
In a statement after the vote, the federation said “Cleveland City Council has unintentionally given credence to the hateful rhetoric targeting the Jewish community that has overtaken the ‘public comments’ portion of the Council meetings each week since Hamas attacked Israel.”
City Council lent credence to those views by not “accurately” reflecting in its resolution that Hamas had repeatedly rejected ceasefire attempts “because (Hamas) refuses to return the remaining innocent people it took hostage,” the federation said.
cleveland.com reached out to CAIR Ohio and the Jewish Federation of Cleveland for comment about Bibb’s decision to withhold his signature from the resolution.
On the night City Council passed its resolution, public commenters, who until then had directed much of their ire at council, ended up turning more of their attention to Bibb.
At last week’s meeting, they continued their criticism of comments Bibb made on social media in support of Israel in the hours after Hamas’ Oct. 7 terrorist attack. They said they’d withhold future political support from Bibb in favor of candidates whose views on the war aligned more closely with theirs. And they called on Bibb to divest in any city investments that may benefit Israel.
Days later, at Bibb’s State of the City speech, two protesters interrupted the mayor’s remarks and were escorted from the room.
Aside from his Oct. 7 social media post about the Hamas attack, Bibb has not publicly said much, if anything, about the war in Gaza.