Ben & Jerry’s has now sued its parent company Unilever to try to stop it from facilitating sales of ice cream in the occupied West Bank. Unilever’s move to continue sales there undermines the “social integrity Ben & Jerry’s has spent decades building.” According to the company its board voted 5-2 to sue Unilever.

The reason I won’t join up  with J Street is that it cannot face two fundamental truths: There will never be a two state solution. There is apartheid in the occupied territories and that extends to Israel. J Street is incapable of acknowledging these realities because it is sworn to the idea of a Jewish state, and these realities obliterate that fantasy. Countless human rights organizations and people of conscience have said it’s apartheid– the humiliation and brutalization of people based on non-Jewish ethnicity. J Street’s leadership is D.C. establishment, but its rank and file know this.

The successful effort by the Israeli government and its American friends to overturn the Ben & Jerry’s boycott of the settlements as a supposed “antisemitic” action shows that it is pointless for activists to selectively boycott the illegal settlements. No– boycotts should be aimed at Israel. There is no such thing as a good Israel on one side of the Green Line and a bad one in the occupation. It is all one apartheid state.

Unilever, the parent company of Ben & Jerry’s, has announced that it will continue to sell ice cream throughout Israel and the occupied West Bank. Last summer Ben & Jerry’s claimed that it would end its business in the “occupied territories” by the end of this year because it was “inconsistent with our values.”
Unilever sold the Israeli branch of the Vermont-based brand to Avi Zinger, owner of American Quality Products. Zinger can now sell the ice cream under Hebrew and Arabic names throughout the region, including the illegally occupied West Bank.

In a decision which could have far-reaching implications for political actions and free speech, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the state of Arkansas was permitted to force anyone contracting with the state to pledge that they will not engage in boycotts of Israel. 

Liberal Zionist author Eric Alterman tells the Israeli left he’s cutting it out of his will. “I’m sorry, I’m abandoning you and your colleagues. I used to have in my will Israeli peace groups, I’m changing my will and I’m funding American Jewish scholarly and charitable institutions.” Why? “I feel like Israel has said to American Jews, we’re going on our way, and you can take it or leave it.”

The New England Conference of the United Methodist Church condemned Israel’s apartheid system June 11 by an 88 percent to 12 percent vote. The move comes at a key moment in the movement by Christian churches to attack by name the apartheid treatment of Palestinians. The Presbyterian Church will vote on their apartheid “overtures” in the first week in July, while the Episcopal Church is expected to vote on apartheid the following week.

General Mills claims their decision to shutter a factory in an illegal West Bank settlement wasn’t due to activist pressure, but the company’s logic doesn’t hold up.

FIFA says it wants to make football “accessible and inclusive.” But Israel is criminally denying Palestine access to the sport. FIFA should follow the anti-Israel-apartheid petition launched by the Canadian group Just Peace Advocates and affirm: Countries that systemically violate human rights are not allowed to play in FIFA matches. Respecting that means honoring Palestinians’ right to live, play and enjoy soccer free from Israeli oppression.

On May 31, General Mills announced that it had divested from its business in Israel and would stop making Pillsbury products in an illegal West Bank settlement. The move came after a two-year campaign by the American Friends Service Committee, which called on consumers to boycott Pillsbury products until they stopped manufacturing on stolen land. Michael Arria speaks with the AFSC’s Economic Activism Director Dov Baum about the successful boycott campaign, and what comes next.