Hundreds Rally At General Dynamics' Bath Iron Works To Kick Off Stop Arming Genocide Campaign in Maine

Photo credit: Robin Farrin

Yesterday a mass rally took over the street in front of General Dynamics' Bath Iron Works shipyard and a die-in held the space for about an hour. Especially gratifying: seeing my old activist friends, many of whom came from far away to lay down and risk arrest, together with the much younger demographic of the Maine Coalition for Palestine. 

While Penobscot speaker Lokotah Sanborn drew parallels between land theft in Palestine and land theft in the unceded territories of Wabanakiya, a small handful of counter protesters modeled settler colonialism shouting "Get off our lawn!" from the union hall steps adjacent to the protest. There is no line of demarcation between the post office side lawn where speakers were gathered and the AFL-CIO property, and a scuffle that broke out when someone strayed onto the union's lawn was the only police intervention witnessed by legal observer Mark Roman yesterday. No one was injured, and no arrests were made.

Photo credit: Robin Farrin

There was considerable outreach to the union prior to the event and not all workers at BIW were hostile, but some predictably disagreed with our analysis on Palestine and/or were angered by our presence at their workplace. Also, it's hard to be told that your work supports the slaughter of infants.

Happily, no basketball bats were observed.

I did witness some protesters chastising a t.v. cameraman and reporter for interviewing the two very vocal counter protesters who spent most of the rally inexplicably chanting "Gaza to the sea!" or calling protesters "commies" and "Nazis" in the same breath. The reporter told those objecting that newscentermaine wanted to give coverage to "both sides" but the ratio of  250 pro-Palestine voices to about 10 pro-Israel voices wasn't clearly reflected in any of the mainstream news coverage I saw. The camera operator ended the confrontation by snarling, "How about you get out of the way and let us do our fucking job?"

Local police attempting to do their job simply closed the street for a couple of hours and declined to arrest anybody. The Chief told our police liaison Bruce Gagnon that the Bath PD was short staffed and when Gagnon asked if he planned to call the county sheriff for backup he replied, "They only have a couple of guys, too."  I did see the (warm) sheriff's van often used to transport arrestees from BIW but eventually it departed without being used.

Here's news coverage we've seen so far:

'Die-in' held outside Bath Iron Works to protest US military support of Israel | WGME

More than 100 protest at BIW over support for Israel's war in Gaza (bangordailynews.com)

Pro-Palestine Protestors Block Road Outside Bath Iron Works, Demand Shipyard Stop Arming "Imperialist Genocide" - The Maine Wire

Hundreds rally outside Bath Iron Works to protest U.S. military aid for Israel (pressherald.com)

The Maine Coalition for Palestine is waging an extensive campaign to support people in Gaza and the West Bank right now, with many more events and actions planned. Today, folks can join Bowdoin SJP on campus in Brunswick to demand alumnus Sen. Angus King support a permanent ceasefire now.

As a Bowdoin alum myself, I am happy to see our mascot wearing a Palestinian keffiyeh. Go Polar Bears!

REVISED: Updated to include photos just in from Robin Farrin.