President Joe Biden said the United States will set up a temporary dock off the coast of Gaza to deliver humanitarian supplies to the besieged enclave as Palestinians begin to starve during Israel’s blockade of the strip.
On Sunday, a US military ship carrying equipment needed for initial construction work on the structure left for Gaza, according to the US military’s Central Command.
The move comes as the United States has airdropped aid as famine looms in Gaza, which has been devastated by more than five months of Israeli bombings, ground operations and siege. Aid agencies said airdrops were not enough due to the scale of the crisis. More than 31,000 people have been killed in Gaza and up to 70 percent of its homes have been destroyed or damaged.
Here’s what we know so far about the Gaza Pier and its effectiveness:
Why is the US building a pier in Gaza?
In his State of the Union address Thursday, Biden said the pier would be able to “receive large shipments carrying food, water, medicine and temporary shelter.” According to Biden, the reason for the construction is to enable “a massive increase in the amount of humanitarian aid arriving in Gaza every day.”
At least 25 people died of starvation and dehydration as Israel obstructed deliveries of food, medical supplies and other aid items through two land border crossings – Rafah with Egypt and Karem Abu Salem (Kerem Shalom in Hebrew) with Israel.
Trucks carrying humanitarian aid must depart from these crossing points, both on the southern edge of Gaza, to cross the conflict zone to deliver humanitarian aid, including to largely isolated areas in the north.
Biden is up for re-election in November’s presidential vote, and his decision is seen as an attempt to address anger within his own Democratic Party’s base over his unwavering support for Israel, accused of killing without discernment of civilians and destroyed hospitals and residences. and civil buildings. The International Court of Justice hears a genocide case brought against Israel.
The United States has provided billions of dollars in aid as well as weapons that Israel has used in Gaza since October 7. An additional $14 billion in aid to Israel, on top of its annual $3.8 billion military aid, is now before the US Congress. Last month, it passed the Senate but its fate is uncertain in the House of Representatives.
During ongoing voting in the presidential primaries and caucuses, some Democrats have refused to vote for Biden, raising concerns about his ability to vote in the November race, in which former President Donald Trump holds a short lead over the outgoing Democratic president in November. opinion polls.
How will the Gaza floating jetty work?
British Foreign Secretary David Cameron said his country would participate in the pier project, but added that its construction would “take time.”
The Pentagon set a timeline Friday, saying the dock construction project could take up to 60 days and involve more than 1,000 U.S. troops.
U.S. defense officials said the 7th Transportation Brigade, based at Joint Base Langley-Eustis in Virginia, was beginning to assemble so-called joint logistics equipment and craft on shore. It’s likened to a large Lego system – a set of 12-meter-long (40-foot-long) steel pieces that can be locked together to form a pier and causeway.
The Pentagon said it had not yet determined how the floating port system’s landing site would be protected against any threats and was in talks with partners including Israel.
Pentagon press secretary Patrick Ryder said there is a risk of a Hamas attack on the port system. He added that no US troops would enter Gaza, even temporarily, to complete the construction of the port.
On the ground in Gaza, there will likely be allies, contractors and humanitarian agencies.
The plan for the pier has two elements: the first is a floating barge at sea that would be able to accept aid deliveries. The U.S. military would then transport the aid from there to a 550-meter-long floating causeway anchored to the shore.
Once operational, the pier would enable the delivery of around 2 million meals to Gaza every day, Ryder said.
The United States has delivered a total of about 124,000 meals in four airdrops over the past week. The last airdrop carried out on Friday delivered around 11,500 meals, the US military said.
Gaza already has a small port near the Remal neighborhood of Gaza City. However, the port has been under Israeli naval blockade since 2007, when Israel also closed almost all of Gaza’s border crossings. Israel claims full control of Gaza’s coastline and territorial waters, preventing ships from reaching the strip since 1967.
Biden said the Israeli government would maintain security at the pier. It is unclear who will unload the aid at the dock and transport it to shore. Experts question how Israel, which has paralyzed the delivery of aid across land borders, would allow aid to be delivered by sea.
Can the pier help solve Gaza’s aid problem?
The pier appears to be a complicated workaround to a problem that has a much simpler solution: for Israel to open land crossings into Gaza.
“Any effort to bring more humanitarian aid to Gaza to help desperate people is absolutely welcome,” said Juliette Touma of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA). “However, there is a more efficient, cheaper and faster way to deliver aid to Gaza, and that is by road. »
Touma told Tel Aviv Tribune that a minimum of 500 aid trucks per day are needed to meet the needs of Palestinian civilians in Gaza. This is the average number of trucks that entered Gaza before the war,
But that changed after October 7. On average, 90 trucks per day entered the enclave in February, and the number of trucks was as low as seven or nine on some days.
Touma also pointed out that during the first two weeks after the start of the war, no aid trucks entered Gaza. This created a backlog of 5,000 trucks that have not yet been resupplied, exacerbating the aid gap in the enclave.
With Gaza’s markets closed, the entire population of the enclave depends on aid. “There need to be many more arrivals, not fewer,” she said, adding that Israel must take steps to ensure that more trucks can enter the country without problems. enclave.
She added that what the United States can do to most effectively help resolve the Gaza aid crisis is to put more pressure on Israeli authorities to increase the working hours of the only open crossing point between Israel and Gaza – the Karem Abu Salem crossing. Additionally, Israel should be advised to open more crossings and increase the number of trucks allowed, she said.
Hundreds of trucks loaded with aid are waiting on the Egyptian side due to Israeli restrictions.
The humanitarian organization Refugees International released a report Thursday claiming that Israel has generated “famine-like conditions” in the Gaza Strip “while obstructing and undermining the humanitarian response.” The report describes the situation in Gaza as “apocalyptic”.
Activists said no time should be wasted in providing aid as Palestinians face famine-like conditions.
“How long does it take to build a seaport? People are starving now. When people reach this level of hunger, they have several hours during which an intervention could help them. They don’t have weeks,” said Meg Sattler, CEO of the international nongovernmental organization Ground Truth Solutions.
“This appears to be just another attempt to distract from the real problem, which is that 700,000 people are starving in northern Gaza and Israel is not allowing the humanitarian aid they need,” Palestinian politician Mustafa Barghouti told Tel Aviv Tribune last week.
What efforts are other countries making to send aid to Gaza?
A maritime corridor was planned for Sunday to transport aid from Cyprus to Gaza. This was a collaboration between a number of partners, including European countries, the United States and the United Arab Emirates.
However, the aid was not delivered as planned and remained stuck in Cyprus due to technical problems.