By Ellen Knickmeyer – Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) – Mourners gathered Thursday at the National Cathedral in Washington to remember the seven World Central Kitchen aid workers killed in an Israeli airstrike in Gaza this month.
Jose Andrés, the celebrity chef and philanthropist behind the Washington-based disaster relief organization World Central Kitchen, will speak at the lifesaving gala, organizers said, and cellist Yo-Yo Ma is also scheduled to perform.
Vice President Kamala Harris' husband Douglas Emhoff and Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell also attended the event. Diplomats from more than 30 countries were in attendance, as were officials from the State Department and the United States Agency for International Development.
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Democratic Sen. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland is the most active lawmaker pushing President Joe Biden to condition military aid on improving Israeli treatment of aid workers and Palestinian civilians. He joined the mourners as the only bagpipe player played.
The aid workers were killed on April 1 when an Israeli armed drone attack tore apart their convoy as it departed from one of World Central Kitchen's warehouses on a food delivery mission. The person who died was Saifeddin Issam Ayad Abutaha, a Palestinian. British John Chapman, James Kirby and James Henderson. Jacob Flickinger is a dual citizen of the United States and Canada. Larzaumi Francome from Australia. and Damiam Sobol, a Polish national.
After an unusually swift investigation, Israel acted on a grainy photograph that military officials involved in the attack claimed showed one of the seven personnel armed. The company announced (falsely) that it had violated policy. The Israeli military dismissed two officers and reprimanded three others.
The trip was coordinated by Israeli authorities and the aid workers were among more than 220 humanitarian workers killed in the Israeli-Hamas war that began on October 7, according to the United Nations. At least 30 of them died in the line of duty.
The international fame and popularity of Mr. Andres and his nonprofit work sparked widespread outrage over the killing of the group's employees. In response to this fatal incident, the regime and other Israeli forces have called on aid workers and Palestinian civilians who are facing a humanitarian crisis and are in dire need of assistance from relief organizations as the United Nations warns of an impending crisis. Demands for a change in the way Hamas operates in Gaza to save the country have grown stronger. famine.
World Central Kitchen, along with several other humanitarian agencies, ceased operations in the territory after the attack. “We are not giving up,” World Central Kitchen spokeswoman Linda Ross said last week. “We're in funeral mode right now.”
Religious leaders from various faiths are scheduled to participate in Thursday's service. The funeral was held early in the worker's home country.
Associated Press writer Menelaos Hadjikostis in Nicosia, Cyprus, contributed to this report.
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