In an open letter addressing the Ben & Jerry’s community that was shared by his partner Ben Cohen on social media platform X today, Greenfield said that the Vermont-based company has lost its independence since Unilever curtailed its social activism.

Unilever and Ben & Jerry’s have clashed since 2021, when the Chubby Hubby maker said it would stop sales in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

The brand has since sued its parent over alleged efforts to silence it and described the Gaza conflict as “genocide,” a rare stance for a major US company.

Greenfield said he could no longer “in good conscience” continue working for a company that had been “silenced” by Unilever, despite a merger agreement meant to safeguard the brand’s social mission.

“That independence existed in no small part because of the unique merger agreement Ben and I negotiated with Unilever,” he wrote in the letter.

A spokesman for Magnum Ice Cream Company, Unilever’s ice cream unit, said that it “disagrees with Greenfield’s perspective and has sought to engage both co-founders in a constructive conversation on how to strengthen Ben & Jerry’s powerful values-based position in the world”.

Magnum said Greenfield stepped down as a brand ambassador and that he is not a party to the lawsuit.

Unilever did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Greenfield’s departure comes as Ben & Jerry’s has been calling for its own spin-off ahead of a planned listing of Magnum Ice Cream in November after years of clashing over the US brand’s vocal position on Gaza.

Last week Cohen demanded to “free Ben & Jerry’s” to protect its social values, which was rebuffed by new Magnum CEO Peter ter Kulve.

Cohen said the brand had attempted to engineer a sale to investors at a fair market value between US$1.5 billion and US$2.5 billion but the proposal was rejected.

Ben & Jerry’s was founded by Cohen and Greenfield in a renovated gas station in 1978, and kept its socially conscious mission after Unilever bought it in 2000.