I don’t want to argue about genocide. I just want to honor Mahmoud.
An Israeli drone strike killed the remarkable man behind the Gaza Soup Kitchen
Mahmoud Almadhoun, one of the founders and chefs behind the Gaza Soup Kitchen, was killed by an Israeli drone strike Nov. 30, 2024. Courtesy of @GazaSoupKitchen
Amnesty International’s report accusing Israel of genocide has reignited the debate over terminology and the Gaza war.
But I just want to focus on Mahmoud.
Mahmoud Almadhoun, a 33-year-old father of seven who spearheaded the ground operations of the Gaza Soup Kitchen, was killed five days prior to the Amnesty report when an Israeli drone opened fire on him in north Gaza. Known to his neighbors and international supporters as Chef Mahmoud, he was walking with a friend to deliver aid to a struggling local hospital.
I never met Chef Mahmoud, but as a supporter of the Gaza Soup Kitchen I have corresponded with his U.S.-based brother and partner Hani Almadhoun. Over the past 10 months, their transatlantic family initiative has fed thousands of besieged neighbors, provided clean water, established a medical clinic and a children’s school. The intergenerational effort involves Mahmoud and Hani’s elderly parents as well as their sisters and other family members still alive in Gaza.
There has been no official response from the IDF as to why he was targeted, and very little attention in the established media. By contrast, for more than a year, as the death tolls have risen relentlessly, the terminology debates in the headlines have carried variations on the same theme: “It’s tragic, but it’s not genocide.” “It’s horrific, but it’s not ethnic cleansing.” Across the ideological divide, others double down on the same terms, believing it necessary whether or not this serves to stop the actual violence.
Can we spend less time parsing semantics? Most of us are not international court jurists or expert witnesses. Can we agree that — genocide or not — the devastation is intolerable and needs to stop? And can we seal that agreement with practical, lifesaving actions?
“People die faceless and nameless in Gaza,” said Hani in one of his first public interviews after Mahmoud’s death. “Mahmoud dies with a big humanitarian record to his name, and that gives us a bit of peace.”
Days earlier, the Almadhoun family had passed the first year of mourning for another son and brother Majed, his wife and four children. A predawn airstrike killed them hours before the temporary Nov. 2023 ceasefire went into effect. At that time, Hani labeled and posted a previous selfie with his three brothers: Majed (“Killed”), Mohammed (“Besieged”), and Mahmoud (“Abducted,” as he had been twice). Hani labeled himself as “Overwhelmed.” He ended the brief post with “Be well and do something.”
“Be well and do something” evolved a few months later into the soup kitchen. “When you think you’re going to die,” said Mahmoud through a translator last March, “you want to start serving and helping others. It’s like a new lease on life.”
The Almadhoun family realized that they could provide grassroots aid to their neighbors in north Gaza where established humanitarian NGOs could not reach. Their ongoing efforts expanded to central and south Gaza through extended family connections, with offerings that pivot according to the needs, available resources, and danger levels at each location: hot meals, distribution of baked goods, water filtration, dental services, children’s schooling.
Hani’s social media savvy provides overseas supporters with daily images and longer updates. We’ve learned faces and names beyond the statistics: Chef Faten, Abu Nashaat, little Hamoud. Along with personal anecdotes about family members, soup kitchen workers and regulars, there are primers on Palestinian foods and sobering facts about their costs.
Occasionally —in understated accounts of his family’s experiences through one devastating military attack after another — Hani makes a passing reference to genocide. Regardless of whether you agree with his use of the G-word or not, please let a traumatically bereaved family member offer his truth. His primary focus remains “stirring up soup, not conflict.”
When we argue over mostly-unenforceable legalities, we numb ourselves to the real horrors that we could be acting to alleviate. “At the end of the day, people are suffering,” said genocide scholar Mike Brand. “We need to figure out a way to just say, ‘This is really bad, what can we do about it?’”
What can we do about it? Well, we can move our money. The rabbinic principle of darkhei shalom or ways of peace calls for interfaith collaboration to raise funds, sustain the poor, and fulfill the imperatives of hesed, or kindness. This principle has led me to support several humanitarian aid initiatives in Gaza and the West Bank. Most of them involve joint Israeli/Palestinian efforts to facilitate material goods and services across the Green Line.
The Gaza Soup Kitchen is unique for its grassroots mutual aid operating within the war zones, reflecting best practices in humanitarian relief: cash transfers support local economies and get what’s most needed most quickly to where it’s most needed.
The soup kitchen also highlights the interplay between small grassroots efforts and large NGOs like UNRWA, for which Hani serves as the director of U.S. philanthropy. While the complexities and dilemmas of UNRWA are far beyond the scope of this article, anyone seeking to understand more can learn a great deal from Hani’s insider perspectives.
Two thousand years ago, Rabban Shimon ben Gamaliel affirmed that “the theory is not primary, but rather than practice; and all who proliferate words bring sin.” I understand this to mean that our words must serve the cause of action — especially when lives are at stake.
The grieving Almadhoun family is continuing Mahmoud’s work. We are in a position to help them and many others. Just as most of us overvalue the impact of our proliferating words, most of us undervalue the impact of our money choices. We have more financial power than we may think. Let’s dial back the debates in favor of practical humanitarian support.
Our own humanity depends upon it.
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