DUBAI: Superdrug has removed Israeli skincare brand Ahava from its online marketplace after being shown images allegedly linking the company to activities at an Israeli settlement in the occupied West Bank, according to a report by Sky News.
The UK’s second-largest beauty and health retailer confirmed that it had blocked future listings of the brand after researchers from the American Friends Service Committee, a Quaker organization, shared photographs reportedly taken at a site in the Israeli settlement of Mitzpe Shalem.
Ahava denied owning or operating a production facility at the settlement site. The company said that by 2022, “all production activities were consolidated within internationally recognised Israeli territory.”
It added that the site is owned by a kibbutz and that all muds, salts and botanicals used in its products “are and have always been collected from undisputed Israeli territory.”
The photographs obtained by AFSC allegedly show vats of chemicals bearing labels with 2025 and 2026 production or receipt dates, along with future best-before dates. Images also showed piles of earth that the organization believes to be Dead Sea mud used in Ahava cosmetics products.
Following the allegations, Superdrug said it had taken action to prevent the products from being sold through its online platform.
The products had been listed through Superdrug’s marketplace service, which allows verified third-party sellers to offer goods on the retailer’s website.
“We have now removed the SKU (stock keeping unit) and implemented additional system actions that will block and prevent any future listings of this brand from all sellers,” a Superdrug spokesperson told Sky News.
