The following is an interview transcript with Shef Jose Andres, founder of the following World Central Kitchen, aired on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brainon” on 17 August 2025.
Margaret Brainon: We now turn to a humanitarian crisis in Gaza, where the Hamas-Run Gaza Ministry reports that the total number of deaths related to the total starvation has now increased to 250, including 110 children, seven of them in the last 24 hours. Jose Andres, the founder of the World Central Kitchen, included us from Jerusalem this morning. He visited Gaza at the end of last week. Good morning. It is rare to take a look inside the Gaza. IDF does not allow journalists to report independently, but they let you go inside. What did you see?
Jose Andres: It was a day -long journey. I was able to go early during the day and leave before sunset, and I travel in Dear al-Bala inside our main two main kitchens. And I was able to visit some warehouses present with us, trying to spend more bakery, kitchen, and a day what teams need to do, what else we need to do, how we are going to grow hot food and bread we are now producing. So it was a day, again, to show support, to see on our own and to assess the status of our own kitchen. And that’s what I have to report about it.
Margaret Brainon: The United Nations says that there is starvation in Gaza, the Prime Minister of Israel says that there is no starvation. what is real?
Andras: Obviously, there is always a gray field, but we are making boxes for children that we know they are in a very special situation. I saw that those boxes are being made in the name of every child. We need to remember that during several weeks, no food was going inside Gaza, and these are two million people. So the places we know that we are feeding, we are eating around 200,000 food in a day, but it is only 10 percent required. This is what we are trying to increase. I can say where we are, obviously, people are being fed on bare minimum. This is not all that they should receive, but at least they are receiving a piece of bread and a piece of food. But we need a lot of help. We need to ensure that the aid is never interrupted again. We need to ensure that trucks are flowing. We need to ensure that we have safe roads so that the trucks can reach their desired delivery location. We need to ensure that people are trying to actively take care of all NGOs to take care of people inside Gaza- and this food, of course, is beyond drugs, etc.
Margaret Brainon: You mentioned for several weeks that no food was allowed. It was a government policy. There was a blockade for several months. Now it has been officially lifted. But as you say, your organization wants to scale. You are trying to make a million meals a day in Gaza. Can you get fuel to do this? Can you get food? Are Israeli officials giving you green lights?
Andres: Well, it is a million because we are an organization we specialize in emergency situations and food, but obviously we are requesting that all the NGOs participating in the food are given more access, including other organizations such as Enra, which were one of the organizations that have been working in Gaza for many decades, with many decades. We need to ensure that everyone has access. For that, we need a lot of things inside Gaza. We need to remember that trucks come from outside the Gaza, and they are placed aside there. And then we need to re -load trucks that are inside Gaza. It takes time. We need more trucks inside so that the trucking company can have enough people and adequate trucks. I have to report that, yes, I saw a good flow of trucks going in. Not me- about 150 to 250 trucks are going every day. But even I would say that this is not enough. We need to ensure that we grow on a large scale- we ensure that anyone has to walk for miles to try to walk for miles, where they can find a plate of food or use a bag of rice. We need to ensure what the world central kitchen does, in a moment we know, 100, 200 kitchen partners. We need to make sure that we are cooking where people live. We need to ensure that we are feeding them where people are, so people do not have to try to bring back home to leave their neighborhoods, leave their tents and walk home for hours.
Margaret Brainon: In terms of walking in the fields designated for food, you are referring to the model that Israeli has installed with Gaza Human Foundation. You are saying that his favorite way to feed people is not enough.
Andrés: Okay, it takes a village, right? Gaza people are facing 2 million people and in A-a-a position. That is why the model we are for- we are moving forward, we have more kitchen, better. Right now, we have 80 fellow kitchens at the top of two main world central kitchens, but this is not enough. We need to ensure that we increase the number of World Central Kitchen, the big people can see those on the webpage of the World Central Kitchen or in my Twitter account. We need to ensure that our fellow kitchens, that they produce between 500 and two, three, four thousand food. We need to ensure that the bakers are completely filled with bread. We need to ensure that we have fuel. So we need to bring pellets, because we have hundreds of kitchen firing every day. We need fuel to be able to cook food. The big bakery we have, a bakery that was in partnership with the kingdom of Jordan which is breading around 50,000 loaves in a day. We need diesel to ensure that we are able to move the machinery to be very effective, but it is only a bakery that is doing 50,000 pits a day. We need many more bakery to ensure that we are able to cover the demand of 2 million people.
Margaret Brainon: Before I let you go, I have to ask you about an incident which happened a few days ago. The World Central Kitchen issued a statement saying that the Israeli government told you that armed people were presenting as workers for your organization. Is this the first time that you have heard bad actors that they are trying to pose as human workers? Have you experienced exploitation by Hamas?
Andre: Obviously, World Central Kitchen, we are a young organization. Gaza is a very complex place. I know that it is still under the investigation of our and all the other people. But double, we are next to the people of Gaza next to Palestinians. Finally, we have to feed Palestinians to Palestinians. Only in our kitchen, we have around 600 Palestine who are trying to feed their fellow citizens, and that is why we are planning to continue to ensure that the Palestinians have to feed the Palestinians, to take care of the Palestinians, and we are going to support them all that we can do to get it.
Margaret Brainon: And I think you met a former hostage, when you were in Israel, whose brother is still being held in Gaza. What did you learn?
Andrés: Yes, I have been- I am meeting with- I am meeting- but this- I met with Eyar Horn. His brother is still in Gaza. You know, we talked for two hours. You know, it was difficult to hear the story. Obviously, he wants his brother to be out. Today is a huge strike in Israel, and everyone is asking for the return of the hostages. This should happen. What this should happen- let’s hope that this happens, of course, with a ceasefire, with peace, where no one is under the bomb, where no one has his loved ones away, where no one is losing their loved ones in the middle of this war, where everyone is fed, where we can start the rebuilding of Gaza, where every child can return to peace, the people of Palestinians and where the peaceful people can start peacefully, where should we start rebuilding Gaza, where it can be returned to peace Can live from What is good for you should be good for me. Let us hope that you will cover the original minimum to feed at least everyone, hopefully hoping that the hostages are being released as soon as possible.
Margaret Brainan: Jose Andres, thank you very much for your time this morning.
