Falafel. Photo courtesy of congerdesign/Pixabay.

By STEPHEN M. FLATOW
JNS

The student association at the University at Buffalo, N.Y., recently issued a solemn public apology. Not for harassment. Not for silencing a speaker. Not for misconduct. The offense, it turns out, was a social-media post that described a falafel bar at an upcoming campus food festival as “Israeli.”

No Explanation

According to the student government’s statement, the description was “offensive,” “culturally insensitive” and left members of the campus community feeling “antagonized, minimized and very appropriately disappointed.” The post was taken down. The “impact” was addressed. And a commitment to “justice and humanity” was reaffirmed.

What the apology never explained was why the word Israeli—alone among all national descriptors—required contrition.

Absurdity

The original flier promoting the university’s International Food Fiesta from Feb. 9 to Feb. 12 listed offerings identified as Ghanaian, Ethiopian, Palestinian and Israeli. After the backlash, the African nationalities remained intact. The Israeli label disappeared. The Palestinian tag was also quietly removed, presumably to restore balance. Falafel survived. Identity did not.

At first glance, this looks like standard campus silliness. There is no such thing as Israeli falafel or Palestinian hummus. These are Levantine foods shared across borders and cultures, enjoyed by Israelis and Palestinians, Lebanese and Syrians, and anyone else who appreciates chickpeas, tahini and the fixings that go with it. Treating the menu for an afternoon food event as a geopolitical document is absurd.

But the absurdity isn’t the point. The apology is.

What’s Missing?

The student association did not say that the label was inaccurate. It did not say that the wording was confusing or poorly chosen. It said that it was offensive. More revealingly, it acknowledged that the backlash was “very appropriately” felt. That is not neutral language. It is a moral judgment—one that quietly declares outrage over Israel’s mere mention to be justified.

Notice what else is missing. The apology does not name Israel. It does not name falafel. It does not explain what cultural harm was done or to whom. The offense is treated as self-evident, requiring no articulation. The community is thanked for its “prompt feedback,” but only one set of voices is acknowledged. Jewish or Israeli students—those most likely to feel erased by the episode—are nowhere to be found. And that means as many as 1,500 Jewish undergraduates (about 7.5% of enrolled students) and 300 graduate students, according to the University of Buffalo Hillel.

That omission matters.

Deletion Was The Answer!

Groups such as StopAntisemitism were quick to note what many Jewish students already understand: When acknowledging Israel’s existence is treated as antagonistic, the issue isn’t food. It’s intimidation. As Israeli writer and activist Hen Mazzig observed, when even the word “Israeli” is deemed offensive, one identity has been made unacceptable.

Defenders of the apology insist that this has nothing to do with Jews or anti-Semitism. They argue that describing falafel as “Israeli” amounts to cultural misappropriation—or worse, political propaganda (it would be an interesting experiment to have named it Iraqi or Greek falafel, and see what would happen.) Some go further, calling Israel a “colonizing apartheid state” and claiming that the label erases Palestinian history.

Even granting that argument for the sake of discussion, it doesn’t justify the response. Disagreement over culinary origins does not require a public apology framed in the language of harm, justice and moral failure. It does not require erasing one identity to placate another. And it certainly does not require treating the word “Israeli” as uniquely radioactive while other national labels remain untouched.

The fix itself exposes the problem. Rather than explain or defend the original post, the student association scrubbed the wording and then apologized for it. Conflict was avoided not through discussion, but through deletion. The lesson to students was unmistakable: Some identities are safe to name; others carry consequences.

That is how language policing becomes identity policing.

Universities pride themselves on inquiry, debate and complexity. Yet here, confronted with something as trivial as a food label, an institution retreated into vagueness and moral posturing. No clarification. No acknowledgment of competing views. Just an apology—and a pledge to “justice and humanity” that somehow required silence about Israel.

This is not inclusion. It is appeasement. And appeasement, even when wrapped in the language of sensitivity, always teaches the same lesson: Choose your words carefully, keep your head down, and learn which identities the room will tolerate.

Falafel will survive this flap. Jewish students can, too. But a campus culture that treats “Israeli” as an offense, rather than a fact, is not preparing students for pluralism. It is training them to fear it.

If a student government feels compelled to apologize for naming Israel in any way, shape or form, then the problem is no longer what’s on the menu. It’s what has been quietly removed from the dinner table—or rather, lunchtime conversation.