Israel Matzav

Norman Finkelstein lives on

Norman Finkelstein may have been forced out at DePaul University - barely missing tenure - but the Holocaust denier's spirit lives on at DePaul where there's now a food fight over where to buy the Humus.

Apparently the activists at De Paul University are made of sterner stuff and prepared to make the ultimate snack-rifice. That institution, which briefly banished and then reinstated the offending legumes last fall, has become a battlefield once again.

Sabra hummus reappeared on the dining tables there until the Fair Business Practices Committee could issue a judgment, but in the meantime, SJP, unwilling to wait for the result, secured a referendum on a proposed ban. As the Huffington Post puts it with understatement, the language on the ballot is "somewhat leading":

“Sabra, which currently supplies hummus to the DePaul cafeteria, is co-owned by the Strauss Group. The Strauss group provides financial support and supplies to the Golani and Givati brigades of the Israeli military, which have been found by the United Nations to be violators of human rights. Are you in favor of replacing Sabra with an alternative brand of hummus?”

Subtle. As one might suspect, the issues are actually a tad more complicated.

Voting is open until Friday. This is the first such campus-wide referendum there in a decade. (Nice to know the students have their priorities straight.) Oh, and by the way, according to a University spokeswoman: the result is not binding.

Two clashes over hummus at DePaul in half a year: once more into the fridge fray. Not exactly the Second Battle of the Marne, but as they say of academic politics: the fights are so nasty because the stakes are so low.

Norman Finkelstein would be proud.

Labels: BDS, DePaul University, hummus, Norman Finkelstein, Strauss

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 6:12 PM