Soup Kitchen in Southern Israel Feeds Twice as Many Since October 7 Attack

OFAKIM, Israel — The people of this small city in the western Negev desert call Rabbi Schneur Koenig a “miracle worker.”

He is so humble that he almost asks me not to publish that, but he has earned it, preparing hundreds of meals a day in a soup kitchen.

Koenig grew up in Kfar Chabad, a community associated with the Lubavitch Chabad movement and the late Rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson. It is based in Brooklyn, New York, but has spread worldwide, performing outreach in Jewish communities..

At peak holiday times, his soup kitchen prepares 500 meals. But since the October 7 terror attackn by Hamas — which killed 50 people and wounded 100 more in this town of some 33,000 souls alone — that number has doubled, as the need has exploded.

Ofakim was always poor, explains Bruria Efune, an activist and social media influencer who lives with her husband and children in nearby Beersheba.

The town was established in the early 1950s and was used to absorb Jewish refugees from the Arab world. Many lacked skills, and the fledgling local textile industry was decimated by international competition. There are still some local factories and businesses, but the city is one of several in southern Israel that has struggled to keep up with the rest of the country.

In a bitter twist, the Hamas terrorists targeted the poorest part of town — the part with the oldest buildings, which do not have bomb shelters. They knew that residents would have to flee their homes when air raid sirens went off — as they often do. They waited for them to emerge, and killed as many as they could. One man who fought back was Avi Mordechai, the son of Motti, a regular soup kitchen volunteer. He grabbed his pistol and confronted the heavily-armed terrorists. He fought bravely, and died.

So, too, did Devorah “Debbie” Avraham (far left, below), a police officer who was working at the Supernova music festival in Re’im when Hamas terrorists attacked. She was a legend at the soup kitchen, Koenig recalls.

There are many others, too, whom he knows — now gone.

But many others were saved. Faraj, another soup kitchen volunteer, managed to survive by hiding under a table in his home for hours while the terrorists fired at him and threw grenades.

Koenig says there were many such miracles, despite the terrible losses.

Perhaps the greatest miracle of all is that the soup kitchen remains open. It relies entirely on donations and receives nothing from the government, Koenig says. In fact, the local government refers needy people to the soup kitchen, not the other way around.

And the need is great: there are families asking for help whom he could not have possibly imagined would need it, Koenig says, adding that every recipient’s privacy is protected

There are days, Koenig says, when he doesn’t know how he is going to make it to tomorrow — and yet, somehow, he does.

There are 14 permanent volunteer staff, and hundreds of other volunteers who drop in — including, today, several volunteers from the left-wing Brothers in Arms veterans’ organization, which began as a protest movement against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s judicial reforms, and was converted into a volunteer movement in the wake of the October 7 terror attacks.

Koenig says their involvement — secular, left-wing Jews — at a soup kitchen run by an Orthodox rabbi is typical of the way the project brings people together from every conceivable background. Other organizations also donate food to the project. It is because of their help that every family that asks for help receives it, Koenig says.

Ofakim’s struggles are typical of many towns in the region that are not close enough to Gaza to be hit by rockets on a regular basis, but near enough — as in Ofakim — to be targeted by Hamas, or to be in the target zone in times of war — times like now.

Efune takes her children to the playground near her home in Beersheba — not just because it is nearby, but because it has a bomb shelter on the grounds. When there are only 60 seconds to take cover, that distance is the difference between life and death.

Lately, the bomb shelter has also served as a kind of clubhouse for children who have been unable to attend schools since the war began (largely because schools lack adequate bomb shelter capacity for all of the staff and students). Parents and teachers were volunteering in the shelters for nearly 10 hours a day in the first weeks of the war.

Efune herself is a volunteer — and is respected throughout the country for her efforts. When soldiers from one unit told her their helmets were outdated and could not stop the new Iranian bullets used by Palestinian terrorists, for example, Efune organized an online fundraiser and bought the helmets.

She also runs a popular news blog on her Facebook page, which is followed closely by Israelis.

There are fewer rockets, now that the Israeli military is on the ground in Gaza. But the nights are still terrifying for the children, she says, with the roar of fighter planes and the sound of distant explosions. Children are traumatized by the noise; unable to leave home, they drive their parents crazy, Efune shares.

The families of southern Israel will be glad when the war is gone. But one thing they hope never leaves is the spirit of volunteerism and unity that pervades these towns, and indeed the whole country.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the new biography, Rhoda: ‘Comrade Kadalie, You Are Out of Order’. He is also the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.

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