The World Central Kitchen (WCK) charity, which suspended operations in April when seven of its workers were killed in an Israeli strike, has marked the delivery of 50 million meals to Palestinians in Gaza.
The Washington-based charity’s communications officer Linda Roth said WCK operates 65 community kitchens across the Strip and two main kitchens in Deir al-Balah and al-Mawasi, locations providing refuge to one million Palestinians displaced by Israel’s Rafah offensive. The third main kitchen in Rafah is closed and WCK is “scouting locations” for a fourth, she said.
In addition to cooked food, WCK supplies meals in ready-to-eat boxes, bringing the total to 250,000 meals a day.
“We have 400 Palestinian Response Corps members and hundreds of volunteers – Palestinians feeding Palestinians,” Roth said. While 100 lorry-loads of supplies crossed the border from Egypt last week, WCK wants to open a new route through Jordan.
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In its mid-June menu WCK plans to include lamb, which is traditionally eaten during Eid al-Adha, the feast celebrating hajj, the Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca and Medina.
WCK paused operations on April 1st when seven colleagues – six westerners and a Palestinian – were killed in Israeli drone strikes on their vehicles. Given WCK’s high profile – it operates in more than a dozen countries – the strike caused widespread international condemnation. Roth quoted the WCK founder, celebrity chef Jose Andres, who said the decision to resume operations on April 29th was both “the hardest and the simplest one we could make”.
The group’s regional activation manager John Torpey said that following the deaths, WCK and Israel have intensified co-ordination efforts. WCK has been “on very high alert to make sure that everything is checked and double-checked. Even if there’s a hint of an [Israeli army] operation going on in an area where we’ll be, we’ll avoid that at all costs.” He added: “Israel has tried to give us as much information as possible, erring on the side of caution.”
Torpey said that after Israel’s Rafah siege began on May 6th, “targeted strikes [began] in fairly proximity to some of our places [and] we really took security seriously and moved our people out of there as soon as possible. So, Rafah is mostly empty [of WCK] at the moment.” This is also true of northern Gaza due to Israel’s blockade and insecurity.
WCK’'s briefing coincided with a report by US-funded Famine Early Warning Systems Network that famine is likely taking place in northern Gaza, where war makes data collection impossible. Word Food Programme chief Cindy McCain said last month that she believes this area has entered “full-blown famine.” The Gaza health ministry has reported that famine-related deaths among hospitalised patients stand at 37. There is no information on fatalities among Gazans at home. Medications to treat malnutrition and starvation are in short supply.
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