Russia: Building a temporary port in Gaza is a dance on the bones

On Wednesday, Russia described US plans to build a temporary seaport on the Gaza coast to provide humanitarian aid to the Strip as “dancing on the bones and fictitious projects that need peace first”.
This came in a response from Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova to a question from Turkish Anadolu agency correspondent at a press conference in the capital, Moscow, regarding the seriousness of the United States’ initiative to build a temporary port in a war zone.
Zakharova said that this is “dancing on the bones and mocking people”.
She added, “When civilians die there every day, we need to talk about their fates, not about some imaginary future projects that first and foremost need peace to implement”.
She referred to the United States’ abstention from calling for a ceasefire in Gaza, saying, “When a country, and I am talking now about the United States, doesn’t want to formulate a call for a ceasefire, how can we deal with initiatives to build civilian infrastructure where they do not want a ceasefire!”
In his State of the Union address on March 8, US President Joe Biden announced that he had instructed the army to establish a temporary port near the coast of Gaza, indicating that more humanitarian aid would enter Gaza by sea through the port without American soldiers setting foot on the territory of the Gaza Strip.
Earlier Wednesday, the US Army announced that a number of its ships were heading to Gaza to establish a temporary port that would allow the delivery of humanitarian aid to the Strip, which is besieged by Israel.
The US Central Command, Centcom, said in a statement on X, “On March 12, 2024 (Tuesday), US Army ships from the 7th Transport Brigade, 3rd Expeditionary Support Command, XVIII Airborne Corps, departed from Joint Base Langley-Eustis, in Virginia”.
Centcom added that the ships are on their way to the eastern Mediterranean to establish a pier that will allow ships to send humanitarian aid to Gaza.
As a result of the war and Israeli restrictions, the residents of Gaza, especially the Gaza and northern governorates, are on the verge of famine, in light of a severe scarcity of food, water, medicine and fuel supplies, with the displacement of about two million Palestinians from the Strip, which has been besieged by Israel for 17 years.
The month of Ramadan falls this year, while Israel continues its devastating war against the Gaza Strip despite its appearance before the International Court of Justice, the highest judicial body in the United Nations, on charges of committing genocide crimes against the Palestinians.
In addition to human losses, the Israeli war caused an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe, massive destruction of infrastructure and property, and the displacement of about two million Palestinians out of about 2.3 million in Gaza, according to Palestinian and UN data.