The recent statement by Ben & Jerry’s that they will stop selling ice cream in the West Bank is giving a lot of people brain-freeze. Personally, every time I look at my newsfeed I feel the sensation of swallowing a mouthful of Americone Dream way too quickly. Yet I’m surprised by the intensity of the pro-Israel community’s reactions.
“If only Ben & Jerry’s chose instead to say, “Our corporate policies promote peace, co-existence, and bridge-building - that’s what those frozen Peace Pops represent.” ”
Of course, the echo chamber of social media has whipped itself into a frenzy, including official statements and actions from the Israeli government itself. And surely, in the days ahead, every Jewish organization is going to feel compelled to do what they do: Issue A Statement. Some supermarkets in Orthodox areas are now counter-boycotting Ben & Jerry’s. So, apparently, is New York Mayor Bill de Blasio. And the Kashrut Authority of Australia and New Zealand has declared that Ben & Jerry’s is no longer kosher!
The unexpected statement from Ben & Jerry’s board of directors was issued on July 19. Under the incendiary headline, “Ben & Jerry’s Will End Sales of Our Ice Cream in the Occupied Palestinian Territory,” the brief statement says that selling in the “OPT” is “inconsistent with our values.” It acknowledges that “we hear and recognize concerns” from activists—implying that the BDS movement has caught their ear.
The final sentence says that Ben & Jerry’s will “stay in Israel through a different arrangement” yet to be determined.
This is fairly ridiculous on a number of levels—a manufactured controversy that the pro-Israel community is pumping far too much oxygen into. As others have pointed out, Ben & Jerry’s statement is all posturing and mildly incoherent. As always with these boycotts, they don’t indicate what specific results they would like to see from their action. They don’t distinguish that there is a difference between the natural urban sprawl of Jerusalem and radical isolated outposts. And furthermore, Palestinians, like the Jewish settlers, will be denied their Chunky Monkey - as well as jobs.
As ever, boycotts are blunt and dull-witted weapons. If only Ben & Jerry’s chose instead to say, “Our corporate policies promote peace, co-existence, and bridge-building - that’s what those frozen Peace Pops represent.” They could have used this moment to celebrate the exciting thawing of relationships (surely there’s an ice cream metaphor there) between Israel and certain Arab nations in the Abraham Accords. And if only they chose to reinvest their profits in the many good people and organizations that are really promoting a better future for Israelis and Palestinians alike, in mutual co-existence!
As others have shown, there are also some sneaky corporate practices going on here. Ben & Jerry’s is owned by Unilever—a conglomerate that owns several ice cream brands, all of whose business will continue uninterrupted. Ben & Jerry’s maintains a distinct Board of Directors within Unilever, and this action seems to have spurted from there. So no one is losing any money: Unilever will continue to sell its umpteen products wherever it wishes and Ben & Jerry’s will get to nod to its progressive amen-corner.
Look, we’ve been here before. But there’s something different about the responses to this particular news cycle. And it needs to be discussed in our Jewish communities.
“Mark this as the official moment when rejecting the settlements became an anti-Israel, antisemitic act. ”
Because Ben & Jerry’s statement clearly said they’re only pulling out of the occupied territories. While in some hateful and ignorant quarters the occupation is “from the River to the Sea”—i.e., the entire State of Israel itself—I assume Ben & Jerry’s is referring to the West Bank. Their statement clearly affirms that they have no intention of pulling out of Israel inside the Green Line. (As I said, the move is insipid. But it’s not quite the “boycott Israel” statement that activists on either side seem to assert.)
Many institutional Jewish responses have linked Ben & Jerry’s with the international BDS movement. The rhetoric has been angry, including most disturbingly the local Israeli Consulate’s statement, which called Ben & Jerry’s action “economic terrorism” with “antisemitic undertones.”
Really?
Avoiding the West Bank is now the equivalent of BDS? That will be news to all the pro-Israel Jews—and they are legion—who look carefully at labels to avoid products made over the Green Line. That will be news to all the advocates of two-states-for-two-peoples who make up the majority of Jewish Americans and their elected officials.
Hell, for most of the past fifty years, most regional Jewish Federations (the “United Jewish Appeal” from the old days) made clear that their Israel fundraising did not support activities that were beyond the Green Line. That’s a very similar policy to Ben & Jerry’s new one. So almost every Federation in America is a retroactive secret conspirator with BDS and Israel’s enemies?
Mark this as the moment that it became official policy that being pro-Israel equals supporting the settlements. And that includes the illegal outposts, of which the previous and current governments choose to look the other way.
I fear that Israel has been inching in this direction for many years, and that mainstream American Zionist organizations have been deluded. These angry responses are part of a tactical move on the part of the right, nudging towards a reality where the only legitimate supporters of Israel are right-wingers.
The times are a-changing, and not necessarily for the better. In addition to the trend that asserts that the settlements are Israel, there are other disturbing changes to the status quo:
· It was a longstanding consensus in Israel that Meir Kahane’s (yimach sh’mo) racist politics were beyond the pale of civilized society; his Kach party was labeled racist and forbidden from running in elections as far back as 1988. Yet Kahane’s students and admirers have established several uber-right-wing parties in recent years, and ex-PM Netanyahu actively courted them to be members of his coalition. Several Kahanists sit in the current opposition bloc in the Knesset.
· It was a long-standing status quo arrangement that Jews would not gather to pray on the Temple Mount, the home of the Dome of the Rock and al-Aqsa mosque, and site of the two historical Jewish Temples. Historically, politicians recognized that the site was volcanically volatile; Orthodox rabbis decreed that it was halakhically forbidden for Jews to tread on that space. But increasingly Jewish extremists penetrate and pray on the Temple Mount, and knowingly violate the law while authorities look the other way. After decades of status quo, suddenly the “eternal Jewish right” to pray on the Temple Mount has become a mainstream Orthodox position—as well as the new Prime Minister’s.
· Do you think the Temple Mount issue is about religious freedom? These people don’t care about religious freedom. On Tisha B’Av—the day that the rabbis mourned the destructive power of senseless hatred—a group of thugs associated with the Ateret Cohanim Third Temple-movement physically invaded and assaulted a prayer service at the egalitarian section of the Western Wall, ostensibly to “liberate” it from the horrors of women wearing tallitot.
I fear that these trends are becoming normalized in Israel—trends that even in the recent past were considered the domain of only the most hardcore and vile extremists.
Look, I cling proudly to my Zionist credentials. My love for Israel is like my love for family: it is unconditional, even when we inevitably disappoint each other. And I’ve been vigorous and public opponent of BDS again and again and again; it’s an antisemitic movement, born in hatred for the very existence of the Jewish state. I emphatically reject the vile and ignorant suggestion that Israel is an “apartheid state.”
But that doesn’t mean that it is impossible for Israel to ever become an apartheid state.
I fear for the country I love if the Kahanists and Third Temple radicals continue in their trajectories towards normalization and acceptance. The Jewish community simply must talk about what these movements represent - and how the status quo on so many topics is shifting.
This is a complicated moment. I don’t care much about Unilever’s foolish corporate policies, but I care very much about how the Jewish community chooses to respond to Ben & Jerry’s. The very definition of what it means to be “pro-Israel” is up for grabs. Liberal Zionists who are still standing must make clear that Evyatar is not Tel Aviv.