A chef finds himself in the middle of the Israel-Hamas conflict
Lesson summary
Hi there everyone, I’m Jeff and this is Plain English, where we help you upgrade your English with stories about current events and trending topics. You listen to stories here and you get exposure to new words and concepts in English. And best of all, we have a website full of resources to help you along the way—transcripts, translations, quizzes, activities, and the opportunity to practice what you’re learning.
This is lesson number 670 of Plain English, so that means JR has uploaded all those English learning resources to PlainEnglish.com/670.
Coming up today: José Andrés is Spanish-born chef, famous for his high-end restaurants in Washington, D.C., and other cities. And he’s also the founder of World Central Kitchen, a charity that serves meals to people in disaster areas and conflict zones.
But now the famous chef finds himself caught in the middle of the Israel-Hamas conflict, after seven aid workers for World Central Kitchen were killed by a drone strike in Gaza.
That’s the story you’ll hear today. As always, in the second half of the lesson, I’ll show you how to use an English expression. Today that expression is to “throw yourself into” something.
Remember, PlainEnglish.com/670 is where you find the transcript and exercises. I think we’re ready—let’s get going.
The chef in the middle of the Israel-Hamas conflict
José Andrés is a celebrity chef. He was born in Spain, but now lives in the United States; he naturalized as a citizen in 2014. He’s most famous for opening high-end restaurants across the United States.
José Andrés first rose to prominence by appearing on “Iron Chef,” a reality show, and by hosting his own show about Spanish cooking on public television. Early in his career, he was the proprietor of casual but high-quality restaurants in the Washington, D.C. area, where he lives.
But in 2003, he pivoted to the high end, opening minibar in Washington, where a fixed-price meal now costs $325 per person, not including beverages or gratuity .
Andrés now has six restaurants in the D.C. area, plus eateries in Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Miami, New York, and Orlando. Two of his restaurants have been awarded two Michelin stars. His restaurants often feature Spanish, Mediterranean, or Latin flavors.
In the process of building his restaurant empire, he’s become a bit of a hometown hero in the nation’s capital. He’s famous for food, but he’s also a cultural leader. He interviews guests across the political spectrum on his podcast. He has been nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize. He advocates for charitable giving, healthy eating, and providing meals to the hungry.
Like any good restauranteur, he is careful to make sure everyone feels welcome at his table. When he expresses opinions, he often sticks to middle-of-the-road topics and tries to bring people together—a welcome break in the hyper partisan town he calls home.
Outside of his restaurants, he’s best known as the founder of World Central Kitchen, a charity that provides meals in humanitarian crises.
World Central Kitchen has served meals in Puerto Rico during Hurricane Maria ; in Turkey and Syria after an earthquake ; at the Poland-Ukraine border in the early stages of the war in Ukraine; and in many other disaster and conflict zones. World Central Kitchen has operated in over 40 countries since it was founded in 2010.
For José Andrés, this is—there is no other way to describe it—a towering achievement. When he founded World Central Kitchen, he had already become wealthy and very famous. But rather than enjoy a comfortable life, he threw himself into disaster and conflict zones, and in the process expanded his influence and his impact.
World Central Kitchen jumped into action at the beginning of the Israel-Hamas conflict last fall. The organization has helped both sides. In recent months, it has been delivering humanitarian meals in Gaza—and they were doing it at a huge scale. World Central Kitchen was negotiating with Cyprus and the United Arab Emirates to source food shipments and to make sure the food could be delivered to Gaza and distributed to those in need.
The charity says it has served over 43 million meals in Gaza since the war began; that’s a big number for a non-governmental charity. It also helped in Israel, serving meals to families grieving from the October 7 attacks, and also to those displaced by rocket attacks in the north.
But now, World Central Kitchen and its celebrity founder find themselves in the middle of the conflict.
On April 1, seven workers for World Central Kitchen were killed by an Israeli drone attack in Gaza. They were working on the front lines, providing humanitarian meals to residents. The workers were traveling in two armored cars with the WCK logo on them; they had just left a warehouse when an Israeli airstrike hit their vehicles and killed them.
Andrés and World Central Kitchen say this should have been avoided. They say they the charity had coordinated its movements with the Israeli Defense Forces and they say their workers should have been safe.
Israel, for its part , says the strike was a mistake and it investigated. It said that there were significant errors and protocol violations that led to the strike. Israel said it fired two commanders.
That has not satisfied Andrés. In a stirring essay in the New York Times , he said that “Israel is better than the way this war is being waged” and he said that Israel is using food and humanitarian aid as a weapon of war. He said Israel is squeezing humanitarian aid to desperate levels.
This is a new role, a new level of involvement for Andrés, who has avoided taking controversial public opinions in the past.
President Biden got involved, calling José Andrés his friend and delivering condolences. The attack on the World Central Kitchen workers figured in a tense conversation between the American and Israeli leaders.
Now, World Central Kitchen and other aid organizations have suspended their activities in Gaza, out of concern for their employees’ and volunteers’ safety. A fleet of ships full of food aid was forced to turn around and go back to Cyprus.
Jeff’s take
Until this week, I had only ever been aware of José Andrés as a famous chef—I’ve been to one of his restaurants in Chicago.
I always admire people who succeed in two very different parts of life.
José Andrés is a restauranteur and his charity serves meals. But in many ways, these are two very different things. Minibar serves twenty-four people per evening in Washington, D.C. His other restaurants are in big cities and serve high-end clientele.
World Central Kitchen processes meals by the truck- and boatload. They were negotiating with governments to provide safe passage for ships full of food to deliver to a war zone. The logistics, the complexity, the safety issues, the fund-raising—it’s all so different from running restaurants. And now they have to deal with the death of their workers.
What a tragedy—and a compounding tragedy since their humanitarian work was interrupted.
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