The US Army Ends the controversial temporary naval pier mission at Gaza Coast
The US military said Wednesday that its mission to install and operate a temporary pier off the coast of the Gaza Strip is complete, formally ending an extraordinary but stalled effort to bring humanitarian aid to the Palestinians.
The dock, announced by President Joe Biden in a televised address to Congress in March, was a massive effort involving a thousand US troops.
However, and according to the US army claim, “bad weather and distribution challenges inside the Gaza Strip have limited the effectiveness of the US military’s biggest aid delivery mission in the Middle East ever”.
Navy Admiral Brad Cooper, deputy commander of US Central Command, told a news briefing, “the naval mission, which includes the floating dock, is complete… So, there’s no need to use the sidewalk anymore”.
Cooper added that efforts to distribute seaborne aid in Gaza would now be shifted to the Ashdod port in Israel.
“Our assessment is that the temporary pavement has had its desired effect by increasing a very large amount of aid to Gaza and ensuring that aid reaches civilians in Gaza quickly,” Cooper said, adding that nearly 20 million pounds of aid have been delivered to Gaza.
The dock has become a flashpoint in Congress, with Republicans calling it a political ploy from Biden, who has been under pressure from fellow Democrats to do more to support the Palestinians after months of strong support for the punitive Israel war on Hamas.
Senator Roger Wicker said, “this chapter may have ended in President Biden’s eyes, but the national embarrassment caused by this project is not over… The only miracle is that this operation, which was doomed to certain failure from the beginning, did not take the life of any American”.
As much-needed aid pavement brought into a cantonment area on Gaza’s shore, the 370-meter-long floating pier had to be removed several times due to bad weather.
The pier hasn’t been used since June when it was moved to the port of Ashdod due to bad weather.
It was unclear whether the US military had begun dismantling the Ashdod pier ahead of its expected return to the United States.
The UN World Food Program suspended operations at the pier in June for security reasons, causing aid to pile up on Gaza’s shore.
The United Nations has long said that delivering aid by sea is no substitute for delivering aid by land.
It said roads needed to remain the focus of relief operations in the Strip, which the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) said last month was at high risk of famine.
