Port Elizabeth NJ Shut Down by Anti-Genocide Activists

by Mark Colville, Amistad Catholic Worker

There are two major international shipping companies (Maersk and Zimm) operating out of Port Elizabeth, NJ, which handle the bulk of arms shipments to the rogue nation of Israel for its relentless genocidal campaign of terror in the West Bank and Gaza. In October, 2025, and again on May 22 of this year, the entrance to the port was blockaded by local activists at significant physical and legal risk, in the attempt to terminate our nation’s criminal collusion in this unmitigated evil. The loading of the ships was interrupted for several hours, and apparently at significant financial cost to the shipping companies engaged in this criminal behavior. Both groups of activists were originally charged with multiple felonies, carrying the risk of several years in prison upon conviction. Subsequently, that was shown to have been a vacuous threat: in response to their collective refusal to accept any plea of guilty to a lesser “crime,” all of the serious charges in both cases were reduced to misdemeanors, and the matters have now been remanded to municipal court.

On August 4, the five indicted activists who had performed the first blockade, most of whom hail from upstate New York, journeyed several hours by car in order to appear at trial in Elizabeth municipal court the following day. This is a trial that they have insisted upon by refusing to take any plea to a lesser charge. They’d made the exact same journey less than thirty days previously, taking two days away from work and family responsibilities, only to be told at the hearing that the prosecution was not ready, and a postponement was necessary. But then, once again, at approximately 4:45 p.m. on October 5, the court sent an email to one of the accused, indicating that the state was still not prepared to go forward, and therefore the trial would, for the third time in 10 months, be postponed again. By the time anyone was informed, they’d already arrived in New Jersey. The ongoing duplicity of the court is on full display here: they show no compunction about arresting people for constitutionally protected public action, and then charging them beyond the realm of sanity and proportionality, simply as a cynical method of coercion in service to keeping the U.S. government’s status quo of criminality beyond the scrutiny of the public. At this writing, the judge has still refused to dismiss the case based on the violation of their constitutional right to a speedy trial.

Inspired by the October ’25 activists, I chose to join the second direct action this past May. (See a filmed report on this action as it happened, here: bit.ly/45HTghK.) On August 6 (the eighty-first anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima), we ten accused were finally brought to court for our first hearing – not in person but by a Zoom link! You can stay tuned for updates on the legal progress of this saga if you like. Just don’t expect anything to come from the courts that even pretends to be about the pursuit of justice. The law is simply being used as a bureaucratic weapon by these duplicitous and overburdened legal functionaries, for the purposes of institutionalizing government impunity and keeping those of us engaged in responsible citizenship in a constant state of instability and fear.