four questions about the temporary pier built by the United States to deliver aid to Gaza

This artificial port will allow boats to unload large quantities of goods in deep waters, which is currently impossible in Gaza.

The US military is close to completing construction of a much-anticipated temporary pier on the Gaza coast. This artificial port should make it possible to transport crucial humanitarian aid to Gazans by sea. In the Palestinian enclave besieged by the Israeli army since the Hamas terrorist attacks against Israel on October 7, 2023, water, food and medicine are currently arriving in trickles by land or by air. Franceinfo answers four questions that arise about this infrastructure.

1 Why did the United States decide to build a temporary port in Gaza?

Since the start of the war, the humanitarian situation of the Gazan civilian population has been critical. Strictly controlled by the Israeli authorities, international aid enters the Palestinian enclave mainly from Egypt via the Rafah border post. But these deliveries remain very insufficient given the immense needs of the 2.4 million Gazans.

The Integrated Food Security Classification Framework (IPC), a partnership established between the UN and NGOs, intended to assess the risks of food crises across the planet, warned in a report published on March 18 about the risk of a famine in the Gaza Strip. “The entire population (…) faces high levels of acute food insecurity”specifies the IPC.

In his annual State of the Union address on March 7, American President Joe Biden announced the construction by the American army of a “temporary pier” on the coast of Gaza. This work should allow, according to the democratic leader, “to massively increase the volume of humanitarian aid delivered every day” towards the Palestinian enclave with the sending “large shipments of food, water, medicine and temporary shelter.”

Aid also began to be dropped from the air. In early March, three US Air Force planes parachuted emergency humanitarian aid for the first time. “The aid provided (…) is far from sufficient and we will continue to do everything in our power to ensure that it is delivered in greater quantities”Joe Biden declared on the social network X after this operation.

2 How is the pier built?

Gaza does not have a deep water port allowing ships to dock, the American army began on April 25 assembling the elements necessary for this artificial port, the cost of which is estimated by the Pentagon to some 320 million dollars. A thousand American soldiers are mobilized for the construction of this work, a military structure called “Joint Logistics Over-The-Shore” (JLOTS), said a senior American official during a press briefing on April 25.

No soldiers “will not touch the shore”, assured this American official. The construction of the temporary pier is being carried out in coordination with the Israeli army, he said. “A U.S. Army engineering unit partnered with an Israeli Defense Forces engineering unit to (…) train on the implementation of JLOTS.”, he explained. Attaching the pier to the shore must be carried out in collaboration with Tel Aviv.

3 How will aid get to this pier?

The aid destined for Gaza will be loaded onto civilian ships in Cyprus, in the port of Larnaca. The eastern Mediterranean island is the closest European Union country to the Gaza Strip, some 370 kilometers away.

Before setting sail, the goods will be subject to checks by the Cypriot authorities in the presence of Israeli representatives, specifies the New York Times. Still according to the American daily, the standards put in place during these controls will be identical to those applied during the inspections carried out by the Israeli authorities on humanitarian aid trucks crossing the Rafah border post.

Once arriving in Gaza after a 15-hour journey, the commercial ships will unload their cargo onto a floating platform anchored off the coast of the Palestinian enclave. The pallets of goods will then be loaded into trucks, which will then be transported to US military ships responsible for shuttling between the floating platform and the two-lane temporary pier measuring 500 meters long.

Once on land, the trucks will distribute the aid across the Palestinian territory “under the coordination of USAID”, the United States Agency for International Development. Several organizations will then participate in the distribution of this humanitarian aid, including the World Food Program.

The American administration plans a “Speed” 90 trucks during the first days of this operation, “then quickly up to 150 trucks (…), as we reach full operational capacity”specified the senior American official during the press briefing, or around 2 million meals per day.

4 When will the temporary pier come into operation?

Three days after construction of the artificial port began, on April 28, Pentagon Deputy Secretary Sabrina Singh explained to the press that the US military was in “good way to achieve” the objective “from the beginning of May”. According to Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides, Washington informed his government that construction of the temporary port was to be completed on Thursday, May 2.

Traveling to Jordan on Tuesday April 30, the American Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, for his part revealed another commissioning date. “We have a maritime corridor that we are working on and, I would say, in about a week it will be ready.” The former advisor to President Barack Obama also stressed that this temporary pier was not intended to “to substitute” to land convoys.