The Shift: Ben & Jerry’s settle lawsuit against parent company

Ben & Jerry’s Settlement

Unilever has ended its litigation with the independent board of Ben & Jerry’s. The board had sued the parent company after it sold its Israeli and West Bank ice cream business to local licensee and American Quality Products owner Avi Zinger.

In 2021, after over a decade of campaigning from activists, Ben & Jerry’s announced that it would stop selling its ice cream in Israel and the illegally occupied West Bank. The backlash was swift. The move was condemned by lawmakers in Israel and the United States. U.S. states began divesting from the company, and Attorney Generals called for the decision to be reversed. The pro-Israel group StandWithUs launched a $500,000 ad campaign attacking the company.

Unilever caved to the pressure and sold the business to Zinger which means that he will sell ice cream in the region, but can it accurately be called Ben & Jerry’s? “Ben & Jerry’s is mine forever, plus I can make whatever flavor I want, collaborate with whichever Israeli company I want,” bragged Zinger earlier this year. “The deal also states I can receive from them the knowhow, formulas and option to purchase raw materials from their suppliers – if I want.”

He also joked that he might change the name of Chunky Monkey to “Judea and Samaria.”

It’s unclear whether any of this is true. Both sides have been mum about the details of the settlement. A Vermont activist tells me that he asked Ben & Jerry’s CEO a couple of months ago whether Zinger would get the recipes and was told that the company could not legally provide those details.

A couple of things are clear, though: 1.) Zinger has to remove the images of founders Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield from his packaging. 2.) Ben & Jerry’s is being very direct about the fact that the Israeli and West Bank operations are completely separate from what happens in Vermont.

“Unilever has sold trademark rights to the Hebrew and Arabic language versions of the Ben & Jerry’s name to Blue & White Ice Cream Ltd,” reads a new disclaimer on the company’s website. “No English language trademark of the Ben & Jerry’s Homemade Inc. has been transferred to Blue & White Ice Cream Ltd. Blue & White Ice Cream Ltd. is a completely separate and distinct entity from Ben & Jerry’s Homemade Inc. Ben & Jerry’s has no ownership of or economic interest in Blue & White Ice Cream Ltd.”

A map on the site showing where Ben & Jerry’s does business has also been updated and Israel has been removed.

Mainstream coverage of BDS always gets a little tricky in terms of framing. It’s important to note that while Ben & Jerry’s has embraced a boycott of Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, they’ve also made it clear they don’t endorse a full boycott of Israel. In fact, in their original 2021 statement said they planned to “stay in Israel through a different arrangement.” However, it’s pretty clear that the whole saga can be viewed as a win for activists.

Ben & Jerry’s is a company that made progressive politics part of its global brand from the very beginning. It’s openly embraced environmentalism, voting rights, the Black Lives Matter movement, and other causes. Palestine has long been viewed as a third rail issue, even among liberals, but not in this case. The political attacks and economic threats didn’t stop the company’s board from suing its parent company or deter it from adding the disclaimer and updated map to its website. If Ben & Jerry’s can show other companies that they can divest from apartheid and survive, that’s a positive.

Victory at GW

Good news out of George Washington University where the school exonerated the Students for Justice in Palestine chapter and its leader over accusations that the group had damaged property while engaging in a postering campaign.

University officials accused SJP and its president Lance Lokas of property damage after a fall event organized by the group and Jewish Voice for Peace. Students had put up a number of pro-Palestine posters across the school, and two were apparently stuck to a concrete bench outside the Hillel building. Hillel is an explicitly Zionist campus organization. Hillel claimed that removing the posters from the benches had caused damage to them.

According to a statement put out by Palestine Legal, SJP initially thought Hillel had filed the complaint, but it turned out to be the school’s Diversity, Equity and Community Engagement leadership who also called the cops. JVP publicly admitted to putting the posters on the benches, but it was Arab students who ended up being targeted. The Palestine Legal statement includes a quote from Lokas:

“I am relieved GW rightly recognized that Students for Justice in Palestine followed all the rules, which is what we’ve been saying from Day 1, but we should never have been forced to go through this ordeal when Jewish Voice for Peace publicly took credit for postering outside Hillel weeks ago, a fact which I pointed out to GW multiple times. There was zero evidence of us doing anything wrong. Yet it was the group made up primarily of Palestinians and Arabs that was falsely accused and charged.”

Palestine Legal also points out that GW Hillel Director Adena Kirstein walked out of a hearing when asked to provide evidence of her accusations against Lokas. She then apparently doubled down on the claims in an email while additionally accusing him of “acts of bias” and being rude to Jewish students.

“A white, Jewish student put posters on Hillel critical of Israeli policy, and she blamed Palestinian students. Of course, the media ran with it. This is what Hillel does—smear student activists who criticize them,” said Palestine Legal staff attorney Dylan Saba. “Will she apologize and take responsibility for the harm she’s caused?”

Odds & Ends

?? U.S. Ambassador to Israel Tom Nides on what the Biden administration is doing in the region: “The realities have not stopped the work that we’re doing on behalf of the Palestinian people to make sure their lives are just a little bit better and more importantly trying to keep a vision of a two-state solution alive.” Inspiring stuff.

?? No surprise that former House member Ted Deutch is smearing Francesca Albanese as part of his new gig with the AJC.

?? Peter Maass is in The Intercept writing about how The Pentagon is naming a warship after Fallujah.

?? There’s a newly surfaced video of Biden declaring the Iran deal dead. A clip from a November 4 election rally shows the president telling a woman that “It is dead, but we are not gonna announce it. Long story.”

“The JCPOA is not our focus right now. It’s not on the agenda,” a White House National Security Council spokesperson tells Axios.

?? During a State Department briefing, Ned Price was asked about Salah Hammouri, the Palestinian attorney forcibly deported from his homeland by Israeli authorities on Sunday. “We have heard the statements from the Israeli Government that this was a decision made out of concern for Israel’s security. We are not in a position to assess this claim, but we refer you to the Government of Israel for more information regarding their stated basis for this action,” Price told reporters.

“Regarding any broader implications of this beyond this discrete situation, we of course have serious concerns about any broader practice of revocation of residency and deportation from East Jerusalem. But I would hasten to add that does not appear to be what is happening here,” he added.

FMEP’s Lara Friedman on Twitter: “Totally on-brand for Biden Admin (and previous US admins). If you think there exist any red lines the crossing of which by Israel would result in any meaningful push-back by any US admin or Congress – let alone consequences – you are deluding yourself.”

?? There are reports that Biden is planning to send Patriot missiles to Ukraine.

? James North writes about Tom Friedman’s recent columns on Israel.

? Lawmakers in South Carolina are pushing a new bill that uses the anti-BDS template for other nefarious means. This legislation would require state contractors to pledge they won’t boycott companies for refusing to provide access to abortion or gender-affirming care.

? A statement by Adalah Justice Project, Jewish Voice for Peace, and US Campaign for Palestinian Rights, and the BDS movement on the Ben & Jerry’s/Unilever settlement:

After Ben & Jerry’s stood up to pressure from its parent company, Unilever settled. Ben & Jerry’s is no longer operating in apartheid Israel.

This a major victory for Palestinian freedom and sends an important message to corporations around the globe that divesting from apartheid is the right choice.  

In July 2021 the independent Board of ice cream maker Ben & Jerry’s announced its decision to end business with Israeli settlements on occupied Palestinian land because selling there was “inconsistent” with the company’s social values. Colonial settlements amount to a war crime under international law.

Then last June, Unilever, the corporate owner of Ben & Jerry’s, succumbed to pressure from the Israeli government and anti-Palestinian organizations, announcing that it had sold its Ben & Jerry’s business interests in Israel to the Israeli licensee. This licensee will continue to locally produce an ice cream product, but this is not a Ben & Jerry’s product. According to Ben & Jerry’s board, “Any products sold by Blue & White Ice Cream Ltd. are uniquely its own and should not be confused with products produced and distributed by Ben & Jerry’s Homemade Inc.” 

Ben & Jerry’s has deleted Israel from its website listing countries in which it operates.  

We celebrate this BDS victory for Palestinian freedom.

⭐ At The Electronic Intifada Omar Zahzah writes about the West Hollywood City Council unanimously passing a resolution to adopt the IHRA working definition of antisemitism.

?? Diana Buttu is in the New York Times writing about Netanyahu:

If there is any silver lining to our grim situation, it might be that the rise of Mr. Ben-Gvir and his fellow extremists will open the eyes of more Americans. Some former State Department officials and diplomats have already called on the Biden administration not to deal with the most extreme members of the new Israeli coalition. American Jewish groups have also expressed alarm at the new coalition. But American policy is unlikely to change in response to these dark tidings. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has spoken of “equal measures of freedom, security, opportunity, justice and dignity” for Israelis and Palestinians, but what will he offer to ensure that Palestinians live in freedom and security with this new government?

As Israel lurched further to the right, the United States and other Western governments continued to normalize and legitimize extremists once deemed beyond the pale — from the notorious former general Ariel Sharon when he became prime minister to the race-baiting ultranationalist and settler Avigdor Lieberman when Mr. Netanyahu, during his second run as prime minister, made him a cabinet minister in 2009.

? Fundraising season is coming to an end. If you have enjoyed our work in 2022 please consider supporting our journalism. We exist thanks to readers like you.

I’m off next week. Happy holidays to all who celebrate.

Stay safe out there,

Michael