Judah Bellin '12 calls for a reassessment of the role of religion in the culture of intellectual and economic success. 

To the Editor:

Re: “A Passover Message Re: Resistance,” Opinion, April 14.

In her Tuesday column, the author attempted to deliver a Passover message in response to Palestinian resistance in Gaza. However, with the exception of the snide comments in her conclusion, the column passes over the entire story and meaning of Passover.

For those who do not know the story of Passover, here is the Readers’ Digest version: The Jews were slaves in Egypt and G-d told Moses to ask Pharaoh to free the Jews. Moses went and warned Pharaoh what would happen should he not choose the path of peace. With each plague G-d sent, Moses went back to Pharaoh, but repeatedly Pharaoh refused peace.

To the Editor:

Re: “WARNING: This Column Is Not Kosher for Passover,” Opinion, April 15.

Like the author of this column, I faced the challenge of explaining Passover to my friends. It is incredibly difficult to explain to someone in five minutes why I cannot eat bread, rice, pasta, peanut butter, corn syrup, etc. on Passover.

However, I find that Cornell Dining has made it easy for me to keep fully kosher for Passover. The Kosher Dining Hall, 104 West, offers great food options for Passover. Not only do they serve the traditional matzoh and gefilte fish, but also interesting items, such as kosher for Passover pasta and rolls. As a vegetarian, I have never had trouble finding something I can eat.

As a student at one of the schools that was not off this festive week, I was left to face the challenge of observing Passover at Cornell. The most difficult challenge for me, like many, is avoiding bread products. Once a year I understand why people on carb-free diets are so miserable. Later in this article I want to express my disappointment towards Cornell dining, for I believe there are simple steps the University should be taking to help students who wish to observe the holiday. First, however, I want to raise a second challenge that I faced this Passover — explaining to people what Passover is and why I insisted on eating my hamburgers without buns.

“If only the Palestinians had better leadership.” I often hear this point from well-intentioned, but in this case at least misguided, pro-Israeli friends and colleagues. They continue to bemoan, “If only they had a Ghandi or an MLK.”

And one can surely make a logical case about previous and current Palestinian (and other Arab) leadership missing the mark. But there are a few more interesting points here. First of all, a Ghandi or an MLK prototype a priori requires the background of either an oppressive colonizing regime or a brutally racist one. Either scenario is not quite ideal, and is fascinating to me that folks, in trying to highlight flawed Palestinian resistance, inadvertently draw this moral parallel to today’s Israel.

Transforming from a track to a dining room, Barton Hall seated 50 tables of Cornell Jews and non-Jews last night as students celebrated the first night of Passover at Cornell’s Super seder. As in years past, Cornell Hillel hosted The Super seder in coordination with Cornell dining.