From Yorkville to Kyiv: How a war brought a Canadian cook overseas to help Ukrainian troops
When Joshua Cabral got to Ukraine, he was advised to download the air-raid app — for obvious reasons.
He was out for a walk the first time the app sounded the alarm
“I remember feeling this spike of fear,” Cabral, a 39-year-old chef from Ontario, said in an interview. “Oh my God, this is happening, this is a reality now.”
The reaction of the Ukrainians on the street around him was telling.
“They’re not doing anything, they are just carrying on with their business,” said Cabral, recalling the juxtaposition between a screaming alarm and the lack of panic on the street.
“It was the most surreal experience of my life.”
As Cabral explains, Russian’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine put him on a path to support the defending nation, in the form of helping to provide nourishing meals for the soldiers serving on the front lines of the war.
A call to serve
Since March, Cabral has been volunteering with the Magic Food Army — a Ukrainian charitable organization dedicated to preparing hearty and nutritious meals for the soldiers on the front line.
Cabral, who grew up in Elmvale, Ont., had worked in kitchens back home in Canada for years, but the call to Ukraine came from a personal connection — including having a Ukrainian grandmother.
When Russia began its aggression against Ukraine a decade ago in Crimea and in Eastern Ukraine, Cabral said he got a call from his grandmother asking if he was aware of what was going on. “That’s your family over there,” she said.
That conversation “planted a seed,” he said, which grew into something bigger when Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
He left a job at a fine dining establishment in Toronto’s Yorkville neighbourhood to help Ukraine.
Ukrainian push into Russia is ‘catastrophic’ for Putin’s plans, former U.S. ambassador says
“To an extent, it was like a call home,” said Cabral. “It was an opportunity to find out about a part of my history that I had been cut off from, and the realization that if Russia was successful, I would be forever cut off from it.”
Initially, Cabral spent several months volunteering with the World Central Kitchen, in Ukraine and Poland.
He returned to Canada and found a job. But being back home didn’t sit right with him.
“There is something that had given me a purpose that I could no longer tap into,” said Cabral, who ended up learning about the Magic Food Army and reaching out.
Serving the soldiers
Ukrainian chef and restaurateur Ievgen “Zhenya” Mykhailenko founded the Magic Food Army with his wife Mary.
At this point in the conflict, Mykhailenko says his organization is preparing tens of thousands of meals per month and taking them to soldiers in front-line areas — including in the Zaporizhzhia, Kherson and Donbas regions.
There have been some scary moments along the way.
“Over the past two and a half years, I have seen way too much shit,” said Mykhailenko, who said that artillery shells could be heard in the distance during a recent delivery trip to Ukraine’s embattled Pokrovsk region.
“The sounds of war, they haunt you,” he said.
He says the Magic Food Army is aiming to extend its operations, with ever-more soldiers entering the fight.
“There’s a lot of fresh blood coming [to serve],” said Mykhailenko, who will be launching a crowdfunding effort in the coming days to raise money for the needed equipment.
Ukraine has taken steps to boost the number of soldiers it can raise for the continuing fight with Russia. It reported an uptick in recruitment levels earlier this summer.
‘Taste of the home life’
Cabral is among dozens of volunteers working in the Magic Food Army’s kitchens.
The food, he said, is a cut above the standard meals that men serving in the military would otherwise depend on.
“Your standard packaged military meal… is basically low-grade fuel. It’s high-calorie, high fat, but very little nutrients overall,” he said.
The Magic Food Army aims “to turn that around,” said Cabral, by serving up “a bit of a taste of the home life” for people who may not have been home for a very long time.
“It often contain dishes that a Ukrainian soldier would be familiar with from their home,” said Cabral, listing yushka soup and offal soup as two such examples.
Other offerings include crepes, sandwiches and even cakes — the latter of which came at the request of soldiers.
“That was one of the pieces of feedback we got from the troops, ” said Cabral. “‘Hey man, we really love the meals, but sometimes having a dessert with that is just the piece that we really need.'”
Yet providing Ukraine’s soldiers with adequate food is just one critical ingredient in Kyiv’s war with Russia.
George Barros, the Russia team leader at the Institute for the Study of War says “military logistics are the backbone of any effective forces,” and that includes ensuring troops have enough food, water, weapons and other supplies.
Because if soldiers get hungry, sick, or end up insufficiently equipped, that impacts their ability to fight, he said.
‘The Canadian volunteer’
Cabral said a recent trip to a front-line area in the Donbas region the meet serving soldiers, in person, was humbling.
“I was meeting guys who were literally walking up to me, like caked in mud, they had that dirt on their hands, and they just wheeled up and spent five minutes talking to me,” said Cabral, who said these men lit up upon learning he was “the Canadian volunteer who has been cooking your meals.”
He also recognized that some of the people he met may not be there the next time.
The perils of life in wartime Ukraine have left some members of Cabral’s family wanting to see him head home to Canada.
But his commitment to Ukraine is unwavering.
“This is not just a fight for territory and land, this is a fight for a future of an entire nation,” said Cabral.
Published at Sun, 01 Sep 2024 08:00:00 +0000
Family confirms Israeli-American Hersh Goldberg-Polin among hostages found dead in Gaza
Israel on Sunday said it had recovered the bodies of six hostages in Gaza, including a young Israeli-American man who became one of the most well-known captives held by Hamas as his parents met with world leaders and pressed for his release, including at the Democratic convention last month.
The military said all six had been killed shortly before the arrival of Israeli forces trying to rescue them.
Their recovery sparked calls for mass protests against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whom many families of hostages and much of the wider Israeli public blame for failing to bring them back alive in a deal with Hamas to end the 10-month-old war.
Negotiations over such a deal have dragged on for months.
Militants seized 23-year-old Hersh Goldberg-Polin, an Israeli-American from Jerusalem, and four of the other hostages at a music festival in southern Israel during Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack, which triggered the war.
The native of Berkeley, Calif., lost part of his left arm to a grenade in the attack.
In April, a Hamas-issued video showed him, his left hand missing and clearly speaking under duress, sparking new protests in Israel urging the government to do more to secure his and others’ freedom.
His family issued a statement early Sunday, hours after the Israeli army said it had located bodies in Gaza.
“With broken hearts, the Goldberg-Polin family is devastated to announce the death of their beloved son and brother, Hersh,” it said.
“The family thanks you all for your love and support and asks for privacy at this time.”
The army identified the other hostages as Ori Danino, Eden Yerushalmi, Almog Sarusi, and Alexander Lobanov, who were also taken from the music festival. The sixth, Carmel Gat, 40, was abducted from the nearby farming community of Be’eri.
The military said the bodies were recovered from a tunnel in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, around a kilometre from where another hostage, Qaid Farhan Alkadi, 52, was rescued alive last week.
“According to preliminary information, they were cruelly murdered by Hamas terrorists shortly before we reached them,” Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, the Israeli military spokesperson, told reporters.
Families call for mass protest
A forum of hostage families called for a massive protest on Sunday, demanding a “complete halt of the country” to push for the implementation of a ceasefire and hostage release.
“A deal for the return of the hostages has been on the table for over two months. Were it not for the delays, sabotage and excuses, those whose deaths we learned about this morning would likely still be alive,” it said in a statement.
Netanyahu expressed sorrow over the deaths and said Israel would hold Hamas accountable for killing them in “cold blood.”
He said the killings prove that the militant group does not want a a ceasefire agreement.
“Whoever murders hostages doesn’t want a deal,” he said.
Netanyahu has vowed to continue the war until Hamas is destroyed and says military pressure is needed to bring home the hostages.
Israel’s Channel 12 reported that he got into a shouting match at a security cabinet meeting late Thursday with his defence minister, Yoav Gallant, who accused him of prioritizing control of a strategic corridor along the Gaza-Egypt border — a major sticking point in the talks — over the lives of the hostages.
The cabinet reportedly voted in favour of remaining in the corridor over the objections of Gallant, who said it would prevent a hostage deal.
Kaid Farhan AlQadi, a hostage taken by Hamas during the Oct. 7 attacks on Israel, was reunited with his family after 326 days in captivity. While celebrating his rescue, he urged Israel’s prime minister to increase efforts to save the remaining hostages in Gaza.
U.S. President Joe Biden issued a statement late Saturday night, saying he was “devastated and outraged” by the news of Goldberg-Polin’s death.
“It is as tragic as it is reprehensible,” read the statement. “Make no mistake, Hamas leaders will pay for these crimes. And we will keep working around the clock for a deal to secure the release of the remaining hostages.”
Before Israel’s announcement, Israel said it believed 108 hostages were still held in Gaza and about one-third of them were dead.
Hamas-led gunmen killed some 1,200 Israelis and foreigners and abducted around 250 hostages on Oct. 7, according to Israeli tallies.
Since then, Israel’s military has levelled Gaza, driving nearly all of its inhabitants from their homes and killing at least 40,000, according to Palestinian health authorities. Israel says it has killed some 17,000 militants.
Parents brought plea to international stage
Goldberg-Polin’s parents became perhaps the most high-profile relatives of hostages on the international stage.
They met with Biden, Pope Francis and others, and addressed the United Nations.
On Aug. 21, they addressed a hushed hall at the Democratic National Convention, where the crowd chanted: “Bring them home.”
Goldberg-Polin’s parents were among a number of hostages’ families who protested in Kibbutz Nirim, near the border with Gaza, on Thursday to demand to secure their release.
“Hersh, it’s dada,” yelled Jon Polin.
“What you need to know, and all 107 of you need to know, is not only are the families here today and nine million people of this country, but people all over the world are fighting for you,” he said.
His mother, Rachel Goldberg, raised her hand to the sky as she spoke into the microphone: “We love you. Stay strong. Survive.”
The parents of Hersh Goldberg-Polin, who was taken hostage on Oct. 7 at Nova music festival during the Hamas-led attacks on southern Israel, say they hope newly released footage of his capture brings a deal for the release of all hostages closer to fruition.
Published at Fri, 26 Jan 2024 09:01:20 +0000
