Screaming about ice cream

Ben & Jerry’s decision this week to stop doing business in ‘occupied Palestinian territories’ caused a national brain freeze

Cuba is roiling, Afghanistan may fall under the control of the Taliban, and water protests are gripping Iran, but the first question asked at Tuesday’s State Department briefing was about the “ice cream war that is churning between Israel and Ben & Jerry’s.”

In other words, amid the myriad issues facing the world, the most pressing matter that day for the Washington diplomatic press corps – at least judging by the order of the questions – was whether Chunky Monkey could be purchased some 18 months from now in Ariel.

How do the protesters in Cuba and Iran, and those who may fall under the rule of Taliban in Afghanistan, feel, knowing that their cause ranked on Tuesday below the newest Mideast “ice cream war?”

If Ben & Jerry’s “dramatic” announcement on Monday that it will cease making its product available in “Occupied Palestinian Territory” when its current contract with its Israeli licensee expires at the end of next year constitutes a “war,” then it is incumbent – as it is during and after all wars – to look at winners and losers.

Israel

As the refrain from the 1990 Meir Ariel classic goes, “But we overcame Pharaoh, we will overcome this as well.”

While a statement by Unilever, the company that owns Ben & Jerry’s, clarified that the company plans to remain in Israel, even while not selling its products in the “Occupied Palestinian Territories,” the Israeli licensee said that it will not heed the request to limit sells to within the pre1967 lines. What that means is that if some kind of agreement is not reached by then, Ben & Jerry’s will no longer be available in Israel.

While the impact of this move on ice cream lovers in the country may be significant, the economic impact on Israel is much less so. Israel is among the world’s most popular sites for foreign investment, with some 400 multinational firms currently located here, and some $25 billion invested in the country last year. Ben & Jerry’s investment in its plant in Be’er Tuviya is a drop in the bucket, at least at the macro level.

At the micro level, however, the move will affect some 2,000 employees of the company throughout the country, including Israeli-Arabs and a handful of Palestinians involved in distribution in the West Bank.

But this battle isn’t about money, it is about atmosphere. The Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, which has been pushing Ben & Jerry’s for more than a decade to cut its ties with Israel and which hailed the ice cream maker’s recent decision as a “success,” dreams of harming Israel’s economy, but obviously realizes that until now it has had little effect.

Twenty years after the BDS movement was launched, Israel’s economy has grown by more than 200%, as have investments in the country and its exports. BDS efforts to stop buying Israeli, or investing either in Israel or any firms doing business in Israel, have failed.

Where BDS hasn’t failed, however, is in legitimizing a discussion about whether Israel has a right to exist, or whether it is an apartheid state – issues that two decades ago were discussed only on the radical fringes of the extreme Left. Today BDS has helped mainstream those discussions, making them acceptable issues even in polite company.

This, in turn, is why Israel needs to fight hard against actions like Ben & Jerry’s. Not because the ice cream brand is all that important, or that Israelis can’t make it a week without a Chubby Hubby fix, but because Jerusalem must react harshly against those trying to deny its right to exist as a Jewish state. Others may be deterred from following a similar path if they see that there is a considerable public and economic price for taking these types of actions.

Coincidentally, Ben & Jerry’s decision was made on the same day that the Strategic

Affairs Ministry – which was mandated with fighting BDS – was closed down. Responsibility for fighting BDS now returns to where it rightfully belongs, and from where it was plucked six years ago for political reasons – to the Foreign Ministry. While The Strategic Affairs Ministry might have been shuttered, the Ben & Jerry’s saga highlights that not only must the battle against the boycotters not be abandoned – even as the country’s economy hums along nicely – stepped up. it must be

Ben & Jerry’s

If the aphorism that “all publicity is good publicity” is true, then the last week was a boom for the Vermont-based ice cream company begun in Burlington in the 1970s by two Jewish friends from Long Island: Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield.

Although the company still

bears their names, since they sold the company to Unilever in 2000 they are not on the board, do not hold any management position, and are not involved in the day-to-day running of the firm.

Regardless, there will be those who will use the founder’s Jewish backgrounds to push the narrative that American Jews are turning their backs on the Jewish state: “See, even a company founded by Jews is boycotting Israel,” this argument will run.

While the company has long billed itself as one with a “progressive, nonpartisan social mission that seeks to meet human needs and eliminate injustices in our local, national and international communities,” the publicity of the last week shows just how progressive and far to the Left it really is. And that raises the question of whether, in fact, all publicity is good publicity.

While there may be little real pushback when the company tackles environmental issues or issues having to do with workers’ rights and racial justice, this time the company is not talking about a sustainable environment, but, rather, coming down squarely on the side of one party in a complicated and emotionally charged conflict.

Considering that the head of the independent external board charged with managing the company’s social issues and political causes portfolio is Anuradha Mittal, that should come as no surprise.

Mittal is the head of the progressive Oakland Institute think tank whose anti-Israel publications are numerous. In one such project called “70 Years of Occupation and Forced Displacement in Palestine,” it is written that condemnation of two sides in the Middle East conflict is akin to condemning both sides in

the American civil war, the side fighting for freedom, and the side fighting for slavery. In the Mideast today, the report concluded, one side is fighting to steal and loot, and the other is seeking self-determination and dignity. It is clear which side the Oakland Institute, Mittal – who frequently posts pro-BDS tweets – and now Ben and Jerry’s are referring to.

The question, however, is whether this is good for business. Ben & Jerry’s is currently the most popular ice cream brand in the US, but the question now is whether being branded as radical Left – something this type of publicity will do – is good for business. The ice cream company could now face a grassroots boycott led by Jews, Evangelicals and other supporters of Israel in the US. Even New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, who is neither Jewish nor Evangelical nor conservative, said he will stay away from the brand’s Cherry Garcia as a result of the decision.

Furthermore, the anti-BDS legislation that exists now in some 33 states could also extract a serious financial toll on the company if, for instance, state-funded institutions – such as universities – are forbidden from contracting with a company involved in boycotting Israel, or if state pension funds are compelled to divest from Ben & Jerry’s parent company, Unilever.

In 2018, following a similar pattern of being hounded by BDS activists to stop doing business beyond the Green Line, Airbnb announced it would no longer list properties there. It faced numerous legal challenges and in Florida was even placed on a list of “scrutinized companies” banned from entering into agreements with state agencies or local governments. A few months later Airbnb backtracked. While there are certainly many people who applaud Ben & Jerry’s for its step and may buy the product because of it, there are

certainly many others infuriated by it who will choose other brands. The Airbnb episode shows that there is a price to be paid for this type of virtue signaling.

BDS

The BDS movement was hatched at the Durban Conference in 2001, and for 20 years has been trying to get consumers and artists to boycott Israel and make it into a pariah state, just as was done to apartheid South Africa.

Its success, up until now, has been very limited. Elvis Costello canceled a concert, a Luxembourg pension fund disinvested, and Orange stopped working with Israel, though it said this was a business decision that had nothing to do with BDS.

The Ben & Jerry’s saga gives the movement a dose of momentum, at least for now. All of a sudden boycotting the settlements and boycotting Israel is on the agenda, which is what the movement wants. It also wants to make it clear to companies that do business with Israel that they will be badgered on social media until they stop – BDS has been waging a campaign against Ben & Jerry’s for years.

In that sense, the publicity alone surrounding the case now is a BDS success. However, if the company is forced to back down as a result of sinking sales due to counter boycotts or as a result of anti-BDS laws, then that would be a serious blow to the movement.

For if even as left-wing and progressive a company as Ben & Jerry’s is unwilling or unable to stay out of Israel or the settlements, then what could be expected of firms for which progressive causes are not the banner they wave?

Ben & Jerry’s is now more than ice cream; it is an indicator of which direction the BDS movement is headed: up or down. •