Ben & Jerry's lost bid to stop Unilever’s sale of its Israeli business

Ben & Jerry’s American ice cream manufacturer has failed to stop its parent company, Unilever, from selling its business in Israel. It has previously sued the London-based consumer goods firm in an effort to block the sale, but it lost the case.

According to BBC News, a judge in the US denied Ben & Jerry’s request to stop Unilever from completing its sale deal with a local firm in Israel. In June, the ice cream maker already halted the sale of its products in the country after conflicts, but Unilever resumed the sale after selling the business to a local licensee.

In its filing against Unilever, Ben & Jerry’s argued that the continued selling of its products through the sale of the business could undermine its social mission. However, the judge did not see any issue and said the company had not shown it would incur irreparable harm.

Unilever sold Ben & Jerry’s business to Avi Zinger in June, and the products were made available once again. It was reported that the ice creams are being sold under Ben & Jerry's Hebrew and Arabic names which means the English name had been scrapped.

It was noted that Ben & Jerry's has a history of political activism, and this often got the company in conflicts. Unilever only acquired the brand in 2000 and the company was allowed to maintain an independent board for its social mission so its activism has continued even after the acquisition.

The company announced last year that it is pulling out its ice cream products in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) as the regions were “inconsistent with our values.” The Palestinian activists welcomed this decision but the Israeli officials responded differently. They were furious and the country’s Foreign Minister Yair Lapid called the move a "disgraceful capitulation" to anti-Semitism and BDS.

As mentioned earlier, Unilever resumed the operations of Ben & Jerry’s and started selling ice creams again after securing a deal with Avi Zinger. The ice cream maker protested and said it was not aware of the sale of its business and then tried to stop the negotiations, but apparently, it was too late.

The Guardian reported that the US federal judge ruled on Monday that Unilever can proceed with the sale as Ben & Jerry’s failed to show that the move to continue the sale of its products in the Israeli-occupied settlements is going to harm the brand.