KANSAS CITY, MISSOURI — What was supposed to be a monumental moment for Kansas City and Palestinian recognition has now been derailed by Anti-Palestinian council members continuing to push a Zionist regime. Last Thursday, council members were expected to vote on special action to support the Palestine American Medical Association (PAMA), but due to anti-Palestinian biases, that special action has been withdrawn.
A special action is typically a nonpolitical decision, resolution, or event that is outside of the council’s regular meeting schedule and requires immediate attention. In this case, the special action was being called to honor PAMA and to call for an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza. The special actions—each under separate resolutions—were proposed by council member Eric Bunch.
“We saw PAMA as a perfect fit for such an honor” Al-Hadaf KC wrote on their instagram page following the withdrawal, “especially as their doctors continue to risk their lives in ongoing medical missions in Gaza, and as thousands of local and national physicians await the opportunity to enter Gaza and provide life-saving care.”
This past march, Kansas faith leaders held an assembly calling on Representative Sharice Davids to demand a ceasefire. During that assembly, Dr. Madji Hamarshi of PAMA shared a message he received from a trauma surgeon who is currently stationed in Gaza.
“Nothing from my experience or my training has ever prepared me for such a thing,” the message played, “What we have right now is the intentional, purposeful choking of the entire healthcare system,”
Unexpected contention from council members–including Mayor Quinton Lucas, who sent an email to council members politicizing the special action–is said to be the reason PAMA requested Council Member Bunch withdraw the scheduled vote.
According to community organization Al-Hadaf KC, the decision was made in order to protect PAMA’s monumental humanitarian medical efforts in Palestine from unnecessary discrimination.
Leaders from Al-Hadaf KC shared their thoughts via a press release on their instagram account:
“It is regrettable that opposition, both external and within the [Kansas City] City Council, including from Mayor Quiton Lucas’ office has arisen regarding the symbolic recognition of PAMA.”
Council Member Johnathan Duncan also voiced his frustration regarding anti-Muslim and anti-Paletsinian narratives derailing the special action vote, “We cannot and will not allow ourselves to “all sides” a genocide,” Duncan wrote, “we must stand together to meet this moment and speak truth to power.”
This isn’t the first time Mayor Lucas has shown his anti-Palestinian bias. As previously reported by The Defender, Mayor Quinton Lucas silenced Emreson “Jaz” Hays by withdrawing Hays’s zoning board nomination after Hays spoke out against israel.
In an open letter to local leaders, the Kansas City Defender detailed how leaders in Kansas City betray a storied legacy of civil rights activism by openly supporting an apartheid and genocidal regime.
“Let’s dispel a convenient fiction that some, such as Mayor Lucas, deploy as a rhetorical smokescreen: The claim to empathize with Palestinians while simultaneously supporting israel is a moral paradox that disintegrates under scrutiny.”
On the same docket, Councilmember Nathan Willet proposed a resolution that would fuel even more anti-Muslim and anti-Palestinian hate. Willet’s resolution—which aimed to amend a previous resolution adopting a “Working Definition” of antisemitism—would add a WHEREAS section to include the events from October 7, 2023, but no mention israel’s years of illegal occupation in Palestine.
Lucas took to X to address both Bunch’s and Willet’s resolution stating, “We are here to legislate for the people of Kansas City for real-life solutions that we can control. I value all views, but cannot support the dueling messaging items on today’s City Council docket.”
Bunch’s proposed resolutions were to honor and celebrate individuals—with limited and depleted resources—devoting their craft, knowledge, time, and care to those who are most vulnerable, targeted, and deprived. The resolutions were to send a “Thank You” to the PAMA and to ask israel and it’s genocide funders to stop killing Palestinians. Lucas saw those asks as a “dueling” message to Willet’s attempt to weaponize antisemitism with revisionist history.
The continued resistance from certain council members—including Mayor Quinton Lucas and Nathan Willet—against Palestinian recognition and liberation is disappointing. Support for organizations like the Palestine American Medical Association (PAMA) is necessary. The ongoing obstacles faced by Palestinian organizations like PAMA highlight the need for a more inclusive and just approach to decision-making within local governance. Lucas and others can no longer “value all views” from opposing parties when one party is heavily funded and backed by imperialist governments to relentlessly exterminate the other defenseless, bleeding, and dying party.
Local Palestinian organizations like Al-Hadaf and Jewish organizations like Jewish Voice for Peace have separately and collectively urged leaders to stop U.S. support for israel’s genocide. They and many others understand that legislating for the people of Palestine is legislating for the people of Kansas City. Local leaders need to understand that as well.
