Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, August, 2015, pp. 53-55

Waging Peace

Ben & Jerry’s Stands by Its Israeli Licensee in Occupied Palestine

It was in 2011 that Vermonters for a Just Peace in Palestine/Israel (VTJP) first called on Ben & Jerry’s, an iconic leader of the socially responsible business community, to stop its Israeli franchise from selling ice cream and catering in Jewish-only settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories of the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

VTJP’s thinking reached a tipping point during Israel’s massive military assault against Gaza in the summer of 2014, the third in less than six years. Because Gaza’s morgues could not handle the horrific carnage, bodies of dead children and babies had to be stacked temporarily in ice cream freezers prior to burial. While this massacre was being carried out, Ben & Jerry’s “peace & love” ice cream was passing through Israeli checkpoints, being transported on Jewish-only roads, and being sold to supermarkets and at catered events in those Jewish-only settlements.

We also asked the company, founded by childhood friends Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield, to visit the occupied territories and, consistent with its social mission, to speak out forcefully against the occupation.

To date, thousands of individuals and nearly 250 organizations in 20 countries, including Israel, have also urged the company to end its franchise’s complicity with Israel’s occupation and settlement regime (<www.vtjp.org/icecream/internatletter.htmlvtjp.org/icecream/internatletter.html>).

Ben & Jerry’s has refused to do so. It also refused to respond to our inquiry about a credible allegation that its franchise purchases equipment from an Israeli company that manufactures in the occupied [Syrian] Golan Heights.

Thus, in April this year, VTJP called for an international boycott of Ben & Jerry’s.

Not long after, in a web posting dated April 10 (<www.benjerry.com/whats-new/ben-and-jerrys-business-in-israelben-and-jerrys-business-in-israel), the company felt compelled to break a long silence on its Israeli franchise and the occupied territories.

This statement, like others before it, deliberately sidesteps Ben & Jerry’s contractual responsibility for the franchise’s ties to Israeli settlements. It’s a classic example of redirection through misdirection. The statement omits any reference to Israeli settlements and selling ice cream in them. Nor does it acknowledge the stark contradictions between Ben & Jerry’s professed values and doing business with racially exclusive colonies built on confiscated land, including the use of Jewish-only roads to distribute the company’s products. The word “Palestinians” is absent from the text.

It does mention “occupied territories,” however, but chiefly to reassure readers that the franchise does not manufacture ice cream or operate scoop shops there.

“We have no economic interest in the occupied territories,” the statement trumpets. Instead, the company asserts, it will allocate all licensing fees from its Israeli franchise “to foster multicultural programs and values-led ingredient sourcing initiatives in the region.” It aspires to be “a voice for moderation that builds a sensible approach to multicultural understanding and thriving communities.”

In other words, Ben & Jerry’s in Vermont will not put an end to its Israeli franchise’s unethical commerce, even though selling ice cream and catering to Jewish settlers violates its “peace and love” principles, makes a mockery of international law, and helps normalize a violent and rapacious colonial project.

We can deduce from this, too, that the company has no serious moral qualms with its franchise making a buck in the illegal settlements.

Ben & Jerry’s speaks of doing “business in Israel” and of a visit to “the region” last year by its CEO, select board members and Global Leadership Team members. The company wants its customers to know that “we are keenly aware of how complex the situation can be.”

Well, not only is the “situation” not complex, it is not even a situation. It is a military occupation and a flagrantly criminal enterprise of Israeli settler-colonialism, apartheid and ethnic cleansing, now in its 49th year.

Certain members of Ben & Jerry’s delegation to Palestine last summer insisted on seeing up close the suffering of Palestinians and the ongoing theft by Israeli settlers of their land and water. These are not unobservant or unethical people.

They had conversations with anti-occupation activists and BDS organizers. They saw for themselves that Israel is systematically destroying Arab communities to build fortified colonies on stolen land where only Jews are allowed to live. They cannot, therefore, be so foolish or naïve as to believe that forfeiting licensing fees in the name of “moderation” and to promote “cross-cultural understanding” will put a stop to this or make the company’s economic complicity with it acceptable.

Ben & Jerry’s is standing by Israeli licensee Avi Zinger, not with the Palestinian people. For all its lofty rhetoric, when it comes to Palestine, it will not be guided by international law, its own social mission, or the lessons learned from a long history of supporting progressive causes.

The latest missive from Ben & Jerry’s reaffirms VTJP’s decision to boycott the company. To learn more about VTJP’s campaign against Ben & Jerry’s, to read its detailed report on the company’s business in occupied Palestine, and to assist the boycott effort, visit <www.vtjp.org/icecream>.

— Mark Hage