A prominent Palestinian human rights activist filed a complaint with New York State over Ben & Jerry’s boycott of Judea and Samaria, stating that it contributes to “more hatred” in the region, The New York Post reported last week.

Bassem Eid, 63, a resident of Yericho in the Jordan Valley, filed the complaint with New York’s Division of Human Rights under the state’s Lisa Law that prevents New York businesses from engaging in anti-Israel boycott activity, stating that the boycott is “counterproductive to peace and creates only more hatred, enmity and polarization.”

New York-based attorney David Abrams filed the complaint on Eid’s behalf.

“I, as a Palestinian, as well as many of my friends, family and other Palestinians, are regular shoppers at Gush Etzion commercial center … where we also frequent to eat ice cream,” the complaint stated.

“This shopping area is the true realization of coexistence, as both Jews and Muslims from both Israel and the Palestinian-controlled territories … work and shop here.”

Eid compares the boycott to the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement. “The gangsters behind the BDS are causing a lot of damage to the Palestinians,” Eid told The Post in a telephone interview from his home in Jericho.

“I want to raise awareness among the US judicial system about how much damage they are causing. If they poured all of the money they are spending on boycotts into building factories and creating jobs in the West Bank and Gaza, it would go a long way to truly helping Palestinians.”

(YWN Israel Desk – Jerusalem)