(JTA) — Following tense high-level negotiations over the weekend, mediators in Switzerland announced Monday morning that Washington and Tehran have agreed on a 60-day roadmap toward ending the war.

The joint statement released by mediating countries Qatar and Pakistan also unveiled the creation of a Lebanon deconfliction mechanism. According to the mediators, this entails a direct U.S.-Iranian track to terminate military operations in Lebanon and includes the Lebanese government but not Israel. The mediators did not explain how that would operate or resolve the current hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah.

Throughout the weekend Jerusalem, which watched the talks and the announcement from the sidelines with concern, doubled down on its hardline stance against Iran and its proxy group Hezbollah.

Speaking to reporters in Switzerland Monday before returning to Washington, U.S. Vice President JD Vance clarified that Israel had the right to self-defense, but that “every other nation in the region has the right of self-defense” as well. The mechanism was to resolve direct violations of the ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah, Vance explained, indicating that it augmented the ongoing diplomatic work.

“We also want to make sure that, you know, when things happen, they don’t spiral into a broader escalation,” he said, adding that “there really hasn’t been a mechanism to have those discussions until basically around 4 p.m. yesterday.” He said that the U.S. had been in constant contact with Israel on Sunday.

Prior to Vance’s statement, the Israeli government delivered its first overt criticism of the diplomatic efforts taking place at the Bürgenstock resort in Switzerland.

Addressing the Jerusalem News Syndicate Conference in Jerusalem Monday, Israeli President Issac Herzog said any negotiations to end the Israel-Lebanon conflict should be done by the two countries themselves and not “by Iranian extortion.”

He added, “Tying Iran to Lebanon not only leaves Israel exposed to constant threat; it leaves the Lebanese weak and powerless, and will prevent their president and government from moving forward.”

Herzog also noted that direct talks were already taking place between Lebanon and Israel in Washington under the auspices of the State Department. The next round of negotiations is scheduled for Tuesday, which Herzog said is designed to empower the Lebanese army to be the sole military force in its country. Hezbollah and Iran are not a party to those talks.

“The disarmament of Hezbollah must be inherent to any solution in Lebanon, and Iran cannot dictate the future of Lebanon – on these fundamental points there is full agreement between Israel and Lebanon,” Herzog stated.

He also thanked President Donald Trump for his efforts on Israel’s behalf, calling him “our closest friend and ally and leader of the free world.”

The Lebanese Presidency said Monday that President Joseph Aoun had received a phone call from US Vance, senior adviser Jared Kushner and Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani, but did not clarify when that call occurred.

According to the Lebanese statement, the discussion focused on “consolidating the ceasefire in Lebanon, halting the Israeli military escalation, and the steps that must be taken in this regard, including the possibility of forming a cell for this purpose.”

The ongoing fighting between Israel and Hezbollah and the IDF’s presence in southern Lebanon has been a point of tension throughout the ceasefire deal between the U.S. and Iran. The shaky ceasefire has been in place since April 8 after Israel and the U.S. started the war on Iran at the end of February.

In early March, Iranian proxy Hezbollah joined in by attacking northern Israel. Jerusalem has maintained that the Lebanese front needs to stay separate and has continued to take aggressive retaliatory action against Hezbollah despite the U.S. imposing a separate ceasefire in Lebanon as well.

Meanwhile, Qatar and Pakistan said the U.S.-Iran memorandum included the establishment of a “High Level Committee” to oversee negotiations aimed at a roadmap “towards reaching a final deal within 60 days, laying the foundation for the immediate commencement of further technical talks” on Iran’s nuclear program, sanctions and dispute resolution. These were the first formal discussions as part of the new U.S.-Iran Memorandum of Understanding, with Vance representing Washington.

The vice president told reporters Monday that Sunday “was a very, very good day. We made a lot of good progress; we did exactly what we wanted to do,” including securing an agreement from Iran that inspectors from the International Atomic Inspection Agency be allowed back into Iran.

Negotiators also created a mechanism to ensure that the Straits of Hormuz remain open, Vance said, downplaying reports of disputes between the American and Iranian teams.

However, Iranian media reported that members of Tehran’s delegation briefly left the room during Vance’s remarks after learning that Trump was issuing threats against Iran following Iran’s announcement on Saturday that it planned to once again close the Strait of Hormuz.

Vance said it was true the Iranians had threatened to walk out, but in the end they stayed and negotiated until the early hours of the morning.

Trump told Fox News in a phone call on Sunday morning that he had spoken with Iran overnight and said that if the country closed the Strait, he would “blow the s— out of them.” Fox News also reported that Trump had said, “You won’t even make it back to your f—— country.” 

Trump also posted on his Truth Social account on Sunday that unless Iran stops supporting Hezbollah, “We’ll hit Iran very hard again, just like we did last week, only harder!!!” 

Iranian officials reportedly responded to what they termed U.S. “verbal threats,” saying that “any form of threat is considered a serious violation of the agreement.” 

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Sunday the talks had delivered “major progress to end [the] Lebanon War,” and added that discussions included oil exports, sanctions relief, frozen Iranian assets and reconstruction plans. 

On Sunday, however, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared, “We will remain in the security zone in southern Lebanon for as long as it takes in order to protect the residents of the North.”

Vance on Monday said that Israel would have to withdraw, but only when it can do so safely. The Trump administration, he explained, hoped to reach a situation where both Lebanon’s territorial integrity and Israel’s security were protected, noting that Israel itself has said it doesn’t have permanent “territorial intentions” with regard to southern Lebanon.

In separate remarks at Sunday’s JNS International Policy Summit, Netanyahu said, “We have prevented Iran from carrying out a plan to annihilate us. We removed an existential danger.” He added, “We changed Israel’s security doctrine. We initiate. We attack. We surprise.”

Directly addressing the U.S.-Iran negotiations, he added, “No matter what happens in the talks, with an agreement, without an agreement, I pledge to you that Iran, as long as I am prime minister, will never have a nuclear weapon. Never.”

This article originally appeared on JTA.org.

The post U.S. and Iran announce direct Lebanon track without Israel appeared first on The Forward.

(JTA) — Ben & Jerry’s Israel operation has come up with a flavor that does not leave much to interpretation. Called “Milk and Honey,” a nod to the biblical description of the Land of Israel, its namesake ingredients are supplied by Israeli cows and bees and its chocolate fudge pieces come shaped like Stars of David.

The company, which split from its American counterpart after a contentious 2021 boycott fight, is billing the new pint as its “most Israeli flavor ever” and, on its website, as a “symbol of hope, rehabilitation, and positive action” after the Hamas-led Oct. 7 attack.

Its ingredients and production come from southern Israeli communities most affected by the massacre and the war that followed. The company, based in the southern city of Kiryat Malachi, said it “felt a responsibility to take an active part in the region’s recovery process.”

The milk and cream come from the dairy in Kibbutz Alumim, one of the Gaza-border communities infiltrated by Hamas terrorists on Oct. 7, 2023. The honey comes from the beehives of Kibbutz Yad Mordechai. The chocolate Stars of David are made by hand at the Korint factory in Beersheba, part of the Shkulo Tov social enterprise, which helps integrate people with disabilities into the workforce.

Even the wrapper is local: the pint is adorned with “Fields of Light,” a painting by Rivi Doron-Gerloy, a southern Israeli artist who was killed in a Miami car accident last year.

The flavor was developed in partnership with the Ayalim Association, a nonprofit that works to strengthen Israel’s periphery. The company said royalties from sales of the new flavor will go to Ayalim’s rehabilitation and educational initiatives in the south.

The Israeli and American Ben & Jerry’s operations are now completely separate, a split that followed one of the more improbable diplomatic dramas ever to involve ice cream. In 2021, Ben & Jerry’s said it would stop selling in Israeli settlements in the West Bank, saying sales there were “inconsistent” with its values.

The move set off an uproar in Israel. President Isaac Herzog called the boycott a “new kind of terrorism,” while Benjamin Netanyahu, then opposition leader, retweeted the company’s announcement that it would stop selling in the “Occupied Palestinian Territories,” writing, “Now we Israelis know which ice cream NOT to buy,” alongside Israeli flag and flexed-bicep emojis.

The original founders, Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield, who no longer control the company but remain its best-known faces, also came under fire after the decision. In an interview, they were asked why the boycott logic did not extend to places such as Georgia and Texas, despite their opposition to those states’ voting rights and abortion laws.

“Why do you still sell ice cream in Georgia? Texas?” Axios reporter Alexi McCammond asked in a video that went viral on pro-Israel platforms.

Clearly stumped, Cohen shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know,” he said, laughing. “You ask a really good question and I think I’d have to sit down and think about it for a bit.”

Unilever’s then-chief executive, Alan Jope, also appeared to suggest that Israel had become an inconveniently sticky scoop of activism. “There is plenty for Ben & Jerry’s to get their teeth into in their social justice mission without straying into geopolitics,” he reportedly said in a quarterly earnings review at the time.

The standoff ended, at least commercially, when Unilever, Ben & Jerry’s parent company, sold the Israeli business in 2022 to Avi Zinger, the longtime Israeli licensee and owner of American Quality Products. The sale was accompanied by a legal fight that was inflamed when Zinger told an Israeli news outlet that, once he took control of the company in Israel, he could rename the signature flavor “Chunky Monkey” to “Judea and Samaria,” the Hebrew term for the West Bank.

Under the ultimate deal, Ben & Jerry’s could continue to be sold throughout Israel and in Israeli settlements, under Hebrew and Arabic branding, while the Vermont-based company said it disagreed with the move and would no longer profit from Israeli sales.

The split left the Israeli operation in an unusual position: carrying one of the most recognizable American ice cream names, while openly defying the political stance associated with that name abroad.

But the corporate restructuring has not been enough to cleanse the palate for everyone. On social media, the new flavor drew curiosity and praise, but also lingering resentment from those who said the brand name still carried too much baggage, even under Israeli ownership.

“I really don’t care if it’s owned by someone other than Ben and Jerry in Israel. Those two clowns’ names are still associated with the brand. I wouldn’t spend a penny for this ice cream regardless. That brand is done,” one person wrote on Instagram.

“We’ve been eating Häagen-Dazs since October 7th,” another said.

Last year, Cohen announced that he planned to produce a “flavor for Palestine” independently after Unilever blocked Ben & Jerry’s from creating one, soliciting suggestions about what should accompany watermelon, a symbol of Palestinian solidarity, in his concoction.

“Milk and Honey” has come to market faster. So does the new flavor deliver a taste of the Holy Land?

One food influencer, who called the new flavor a “statement,” offered a less scriptural verdict on the taste, shrugging that it “tastes like vanilla with chocolate chips” — a conclusion echoed by others in Israeli food aficionado groups, who lamented that the honey was barely noticeable.

One commented, referring to dairy-free desserts made to comply with kosher laws prohibiting the mixing of milk and meat: “Not the tastiest thing I’ve ever eaten, but not as bad as a pareve dessert either.”

This article originally appeared on JTA.org.

The post Years after a boycott fight, Ben & Jerry’s Israel debuts a flavor celebrating Israeli resilience appeared first on The Forward.

(JTA) — New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani on Thursday night accused the American Israel Public Affairs Committee of spending “millions in dark money” to ensure pro-Israel candidates win seats in tthe November midterms.

Mamdani made his remarks at a rally headlined by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) at Kings Theater in Brooklyn ahead of Tuesday’s Democratic primaries for progressive congressional candidates. He called on the crowd to help elect Jewish former New York City Comptroller Brad Lander, State Assembly member Claire Valdez and former Columbia encampment organizer Darializa Avila Chevalier. 

In a fiery 30-minute speech, Mamdani took aim not just at AIPAC but also Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his handling of the war in Gaza. He claimed that  “The monsters that we are up against, they take many different forms,” and then singled out AIPAC.

He described the major pro-Israel lobby as an organization “for whom the only thing more frightening than democracy being allowed to run its course is an end to genocide and Netanyahu’s wars.”

Mamdani continued by alleging that AIPAC moves “millions in dark money to accomplish a single goal, to preserve their power so that they can turn us against one another instead of our leaders turning towards the moral change we all know to be necessary.”

AIPAC did not respond to a request for comment about Mamdani’s remarks.

The lobby, whose endorsement was once heavily sought by politicians on both sides of the aisle, has increasingly come under fire for its campaign tactics. Pro-Israel Democrats are particularly struggling to hold onto seats as voters on the left increasingly turn against the Jewish state.

Sanders, for his part, doubled down on criticism of AIPAC when he took the stage. “The American people understand that a large part of our horrific foreign policy is impacted by AIPAC funding,” he said.

Turning to the local races, Mamdani voiced support for Valdez for her opposition to Israel. “When other Democrats chose to look the other way as Netanyahu committed war crimes, Claire didn’t just name the genocide,” he said. “She organized for a ceasefire.”

In a change of tone, Mamdani emphasized unity, including an appeal to Jewish voters.

“Whether you worship at shul, at a mosque, in a church, a gurdwara, a temple, or you don’t worship at all, we share a belief that our city deserves leaders who lead with hope and not fear,” the mayor said.

He added, “No matter where we live, how old we are, what train we take in the morning, or what bagel we order, we are New Yorkers and we want the same things,” including “a city that belongs to all of us.”

Reaction on social media was swift. One self-described mom from New York City posted on X of the rally and the Democratic Socialists of America there: “It’s pretty transparent and vile how Zohran Mamdani and the DSA are using ‘AIPAC’ as a euphemism for Jews, and how Brad Lander is going right along with it.”

Jewish writer Dovi Safier also criticized the comments, writing, “The mayor of the city with the world’s largest Jewish population is pushing conspiracy theories about ‘money men’ who ‘move millions in dark money’ to ‘turn us against one another’ — and calling them ‘monsters.’ Subtle.”

This article originally appeared on JTA.org.

The post Mamdani calls AIPAC ‘monsters’ in rally ahead of NY primaries appeared first on The Forward.