‘80 years after Holocaust, there is a price for Jewish blood’ - Shurat Hadin head
“80 years after the Holocaust, there is a price for Jewish blood,” Shurat Hadin director Nitsana Darshan-Leitner said Monday at the Jerusalem Post Conference in New York.The Cold, Hard Truth About Ben & Jerry’s
To exact a price from terrorists, “the private sector [needs] to take part in this war,” she said, rejecting the idea that fighting terrorism is solely the job of the government and the defense establishment. “The only way to fight terrorism is everyone together – me, you, everyone.”
Speaking on “The Price of Terror” panel along with Stuart Force, father of American terrorism victim Taylor Force, Darshan-Leitner said if you see “a lawless regime, terrorism is on the rise.”
“Shurat Hadin was established to choke off the pipeline of the money of terrorism to make sure no one is killing Jews” and doesn’t pay a price, she said.
“Private people built the State of Israel; private people keep it safe,” she added.
Force talked about how he became involved in the campaign against the Palestinians' “pay for slay” policy, in which the Palestinian Authority pays money to terrorists who have killed Israelis.
“There was a program in place – ‘pay for slay,’” he said. “I knew something had to be done.”
Force said when Darshan-Leitner approached him to file lawsuits, he immediately came onboard.
Yet Cohen and Greenfield seem to be suffering from convenient memory loss — and, conspicuously, not one journalist cited the actual text of the agreement negotiated in April 2000.Activism vs. Journalism Contrasting the Ben & Jerry Interviews of Mehdi Hasan and Alexi McCammond
Unilever’s $326 million acquisition of Ben & Jerry’s Homemade Inc. was the subject of complex negotiations, resulting in a lengthy document regulating both company’s rights and obligations down to the last detail. In point of fact, Richard Goldstein — who, as then-president of Unilever USA, served as the global organization’s chief negotiator — once called it “by far the most unique deal” he was ever involved in.
Under the terms of the sales contract, as published by the US Securities and Exchange Commission, Unilever was given control over the “financial and operational aspects” of Ben & Jerry’s. Meanwhile, the independent board only retained responsibility “with respect to the enhancement of the Social Mission Priorities…of the Company, as they may evolve, and the preservation of the essential integrity of the Ben & Jerry’s brand-name.”
The agreement does not grant the independent board the explicit authority to withdraw Ben & Jerry’s from countries it disagrees with. Schedule 6.14, an addendum to the merger deal that clarifies some of the firm’s social objectives, lists everything from promoting “sustainable agriculture efforts” to continuing “the purchase of non-rBGH milk and cream primarily from Vermont farms,” but — crucially — does not mention geopolitics.
Moreover, the contract limits the board’s discretion within the bounds of “commercial reasonableness.” And one can hardly deny that effectively boycotting a market of 9.2 million consumers impacts the financial and operational aspects of Ben & Jerry’s, especially in light of the massive monetary repercussions Unilever has faced due to counter-boycotts.
At the same time, it is imperative to note that Cohen and Greenfield explicitly agreed to “use commercially reasonable efforts to obtain (at [Ben & Jerry’s] expense) for [Unilever] the right to conduct all facets of the Business in Israel.” Legal experts have pointed out that, “as a matter of contract law, a highly generalized contractual provision giving Ben and Jerry’s board the final say on amorphous ‘social mission priorities’ cannot override a specific and tangible legal commitment to conduct business in Israel.”
This prompts the question: did MSNBC and Mehdi Hasan fail to do their due diligence or are they letting Cohen and Greenfield actively mislead the show’s 443,00 viewers about the Ben & Jerry’s “cone-undrum”?
As HonestReporting detailed in a July 31 piece, Ben & Jerry’s refusal to back down on this issue is indicative of how its board views Israel as uniquely bad, even as the famously “woke” company continues to sell ice cream in the disputed territories of Cyprus and Gibraltar.
NBC News’ biography of Mehdi Hasan claims he is “an award-winning journalist known for riveting one-on-one conversations.” However, Hasan fell far short of “award-winning journalism” during his recent segment interviewing the cofounders of Ben & Jerry’s. This is particularly evident when one contrasts his interview with that of Axios’ Alexi McCammond, who delivered a masterclass while interviewing the same subjects just last year. While the latter handled her interview with a professional focus on getting her subjects to address and dig into the issues, the former seemed focused on preserving his preferred narrative.
Both interviews dealt with Ben & Jerry’s decision to stop selling ice cream in the West Bank, a decision which effectively meant it would stop selling ice cream to the entirety of the Jewish state, not just settlements.
Consider just this portion which Hasan proudly tweeted, when he asks Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield:
“Then a lot of bad faith actors try to claim that not wanting to sell Ben and Jerry’s ice cream in the occupied territories illegally occupied is somehow anti-Jewish antisemitic. As someone yourself who is Jewish but who’s been critical of Israel’s occupation for many years now, what is your response to those critics?”
Putting aside Hasan’s obsession with tokenism and mocking concerns of antisemitism, his question is, professionally speaking, unserious. It begins with Hasan describing Ben & Jerry’s critics as “bad faith actors.” That is, he begins by portraying the story as good faith truth versus bad faith slander. There is then no subsequent genuine effort to unpack the criticisms, explore the arguments, and allow for his audience to get an honest assessment of the competing narratives.
Note that this isn’t for lack of time. Indeed, the Mehdi Hasan interview ran about five minutes, the same length as that of the relevant portion of the Axios interview.