Unilever, the parent company that owns the Ben & Jerry's ice cream, challenges an Israeli distributor seeking to market "Judea and Samaria's Ben & Jerry's" ice cream with similar packaging and the slogan "Frozen Chosen People."
According to the New York Post, the move was made by "the Shurat HaDin Israel Law Center, a Zionist advocacy group that claimed Ben & Jerry's plan to stop selling ice cream in the region amounted to "abandonment" of its trademark there." This summer, the trademark-holding ice cream company's founders Bennett Cohen and Jerry Greenfield publically announced their decision to cease distribution of their product in "Occupied Palestinian Territory" in a New York Times op-ed.
Partner Brad D. Rose, a member of Pryor Cashman's Executive Committee and chair of the firm's Intellectual Property Group, provided comments on the legal premise. According to the New York Post:
Trademark experts told The Post that at least on legal ground Unilever appears to be on solid footing with its trademark in Israel.
"You don't have to use the mark in every town and region to be covered by a trademark," intellectual property attorney, Brad D. Rose of Pryor Cashman LLP told The Post. "It doesn't mean that [Unilever's] trademark is exposed because it isn't selling in one region."
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