Interior Minister: Israel mobilizes popular US boycott of Ben & Jerry’s

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Interior Minister Ayelet Shaked visited Israel’s local Ben & Jerry’s ice cream factory on Wednesday in a show of support after the US confectionery maker announced earlier this week that it will no longer allow its products to be supplied to Israeli settlements in the Palestinian territories.

Shaked said Israeli authorities are enlisting the help of Jewish and evangelical communities, as well as pro-Israel groups in the United States, to boycott the ice cream factory “until they change their despicable decision.”

“Ben & Jerry’s International has chosen to absorb terrorist and anti-Semitic organizations rather than devotion to its licensed Israeli carrier,” she said at the factory located in Beer Tuvia, a southern district near the city of Kiryat Malachi.

Shaked said Israel would do everything it could in the “legal, consumer and diplomatic arenas” against the US product to get it to reverse its decision.

On Monday, Ben & Jerry’s announced that it would no longer distribute its products in the “occupied Palestinian territories,” an apparent reference to West Bank and East Jerusalem settlements.

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She said the decision would take effect at the end of 2022, when her contract with the current Israeli manufacturer and distributor expires. The future of Ben & Jerry’s sales throughout Israel as of 2023 remains in question.

At the factory, Shaked urged Israelis to keep buying locally produced Ben & Jerry ice cream, along with the need to “fight against American Ben & Jerry”.

“We have a year and a half to change this antisemitic decision,” she said.

Ben & Jerry’s Global management has chosen to lick terrorism and anti-Semitic organizations, we have a year and a half to change that decision. Keep buying Ben & Jerry’s ice cream in Israel. pic.twitter.com/3ONLzNLuSC

– איילת שקד Ayelet__Shaked July 21, 2021

On Tuesday, Gilad Erdan, Israel’s ambassador to the United States and the United Nations, sent letters to the governors of the 35 US states that have enacted legislation against the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, demanding that Ben & Jerry’s be punished for its decision. .

“I am asking you to consider speaking out against the company’s decision, and taking any other relevant steps, including relations with the laws of your state and commercial transactions between Ben and Jerry’s and your state,” read the letter from Erdan, who said he coordinated the move with Foreign Minister Yair Lapid.

States that have passed anti-BDS legislation include Florida, Illinois, New York, New Jersey, California, Maryland and Texas — but not Vermont, where Ben & Jerry’s is headquartered.

At a US State Department news conference on Tuesday, spokesman Ned Price said he had “no reaction to his offer regarding the actions of a private company” when asked about the situation, but reiterated that White House officials “strongly reject the boycott movement, which unfairly singled out Israel.”

Meanwhile, a growing number of halal supermarkets in the United States and around the world have announced that they will stop stocking Ben & Jerry’s products following the decision.

Morton Williams, a chain of 16 supermarkets in the New York City area, said it would cut the number of Ben & Jerry products it sells by 70%, stop promoting them in its weekly circulars and display them in hard-to-find locations in its stores.

Seasons, which has six stores in and around New York, said it would remove all Ben & Jerry’s products from its stores, saying, “We stand with Israel. Always.”

In Teaneck, New Jersey, home to a large Jewish population, both Cedar Market and Glatt Express, as well as Grand & Essex in neighboring Bergenfield, New Jersey, said they would stop selling ice cream.

Kosher Kingdom, located in Melbourne, Australia, said it would also stop selling Ben & Jerry’s and offload its remaining inventory at a discount.

On Wednesday, the Sydney-based kosher authority announced that it would remove Ben & Jerry’s ice cream from its list of approved products in protest of the settlement boycott.

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