A march to protest Ben & Jerry’s decision to stop selling its products in the West Bank and eastern Jerusalem is scheduled to take place in New York City on Thursday.
Participants will gather at the New York Public Library and then go on to a Ben & Jerry’s store in Times Square in support of ending racism “in corporate policies,” according to the End Jew Hatred grassroots movement, which is organizing the event.
The move comes in the wake of a statement posted on the company’s website last month saying “it is inconsistent with our values for Ben & Jerry’s ice-cream to be sold in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT).”
The dessert company founded in 1978 by Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield was sold to the British multinational food giant Unilever in 2000, though the two apparently have a say in when it comes to social-justice action.
During the Aug. 12 march, activists and community leaders will hand out educational materials about the BDS movement against Israel (and free ice-cream) while calling for a “week of action” at Ben & Jerry’s locations around the world.
Elected officials and religious leaders plan to partake in the march, in addition to private security and officials from the New York Police Department, according to organizers.
End Jew Hatred said: “Ben & Jerry’s illegal boycott is the biggest act of corporate anti-Semitism since Airbnb, which ended up settling multiple lawsuits and reversing its discriminatory policy. Ben & Jerry’s act creates an atmosphere where Jew-hatred is legitimized and emboldens violence against Jews. Just [last] weekend, mobs demanding global violence against Jews took to the streets of Brooklyn. This is a consequence of normalizing Jew-hatred, which is what Ben & Jerry’s is doing.”
