WyBlog

Princeton students to vote on school offering alternate hummus brands

Princeton University's great hummus war is going to the polls this week.

Undergraduates began voting today on a controversial referendum that calls for the student government to ask the university to provide alternative brands of hummus in its food court and campus stores. The Princeton Committee on Palestine, a student group, campaigned for the referendum after it learned the school's current hummus supplier, Sabra, has ties to a company that supports the Israeli military.

"This is about allowing students to send a message," said Princeton senior Yoel Bitran,one of the organizers of the referendum. "We oppose violations of human rights no matter who commits them."

Princeton officials said the hummus in the campus dining halls is made fresh from scratch. But for the last four or five years the packaged hummus in the student center food court and campus convenience stores has been supplied by Sabra, an American company based in New York and Virginia.

Sabra is co-owned by PepsiCo and the Strauss Group, a food company headquartered in Israel. The Strauss Group website says its donations program provides pocket money and care packages for soldiers in the Golani Brigade, an infantry unit in the Israeli military.