Why Food is a Right, Not a Weapon
Food. I write about it and think about it constantly. It’s what John and I talk about all day, every day: how to best raise the food we grow on our farm, how to teach others about healthy eating, where to find great meals in the state.
Yet as a farmer, “food” is more than that. It’s our purpose in life to care for animals and plants. It is a service to humankind. Farmers (particularly those who grow food crops) truly do feed the world, and whether you’re raising a 1/4 acre of heirloom tomatoes or harvesting thousands of acres of wheat, the work we do is sacred.
Yes, sacred.
We quite literally nourish and provide others with the very sustenance of life itself.
Now food is being used as a weapon to starve out Palestinians, as we farmers—and the entire world—sit on the sidelines and watch.
Yes, there are Palestinians who want to destroy Israel, and some tried to do so on October 6th, 2023. But as an American Jew taught that genocide—all genocide— should “never happen again,” it makes me sick to my stomach to see “my people” acting in such a hideous manner.
As the New York Times reported May 30th:
With international alarm surging over its total blockade, Israel allowed in a drip of aid starting last week. That enabled some bakeries to reopen. But humanitarian officials said it did little to alleviate Gaza’s enormous needs and to stop the territory’s slide toward famine. Limited amounts of food began being distributed to residents on Tuesday under a much-criticized plan backed by Israel.
Do unto others as you would have them do unto you, I was taught.
It is easy to feel hopeless about such a situation—I certainly do. But I also know it’s time that farmers stand up for the basic human right of everyone to have access to the food we grow. The products we spend our lives cultivating for others should be delivered to the public as a sacrament, not used for political and other bullying purposes.
I call on farm organizations like the American Farm Bureau, the National Farmers Union, United Farm Workers of America, on farms big and small, growing everything from soy beans from organic apples, to shout out—NO! No, we will not have the fruits of our labor used as weapons. We will not condone actions that deny people the right to food, to life.
Please call out in the comments and share this post widely, particularly with other farmers. Please use it as a petition, as a declaration of our moral outrage. Together, we must take a stand.
Beth Hoffman runs Whippoorwill Creek Farm with her husband in south central Iowa. She is the author of Bet the Farm: The Dollars and Sense of Growing Food in America and is the host of At the Iowa Farm Table Podcast.
She is also a proud member of the Iowa Writers Collaborative—join to receive the Wednesday and Sunday round-up. She also teaches at (and loves to go to) the Okoboji Writing Retreat, held this year September 28, 29, and 30, 2025.
As always, Beth, you take an encompassing view of something -- food in this case -- that we should all embrace as a source of life on which we are all dependent. And for those who produce it, they should demand that the product of their labors be used only for the good for which it was intended. At best, your words will inspire others to take a stand; at least, it will cause others to pause and ponder. Thanks.
Beth, You are so right about using food as a weapon. All people, no matter their language, their beliefs, their heritage, their skin color, have a right to live, not starve.