Chickpeas of Wrath
The guy who thought that breaking bread was a way to bring people together needs to spend some time in the modern Middle East. First, there were the Palestinians accusing Israel of appropriating falafel. Now, the Lebanese are accusing the Jews of stealing hummus from them. Not only is a Lebanese trade group insisting that hummus is a Lebanese creation (an assertion which is far from proven), but they are petitioning the EU to recognize hummus, as well as tabbouleh and arak as belonging to them. For those unfamiliar with the EU’s curious rules about such things, recognizing "hummus" as Lebanese, in the same way that "champagne" is French and "feta" is Greek, would prohibit any other country from using that label for it’s own tasty chickpea spread. While Jewdar neither knows nor cares who invented hummus, compared to that whole monotheism thing that they borrowed from us, mashing up chickeas with tehina and garlic hardly seems such a serious swipe.
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