The pier built by the US military to bring aid to Gaza is being removed to protect it from bad weather, and the US is considering not re-installing it unless aid begins flowing out into the population again, several US officials said on Friday.
While the military has helped deliver desperately needed food through the pier, the vast majority of it is still sitting in the adjacent storage yard because of the difficulty that agencies have had moving it to areas in Gaza where it is most needed, and that storage area is almost full.
The pier has been instrumental in getting more than 15 million pounds, or 6.8 million kilogrammes, of food into Gaza but has faced multiple setbacks.
Rough seas damaged the pier just days into its initial operations, but the bigger challenge has been that humanitarian convoys have stopped carrying the aid from the pier’s storage area further into Gaza, to get it into civilians’ hands, because they have come under attack.
US officials, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss military movements, said the military could reinstall the pier once the bad weather passes in the coming days, but the final decision on whether to reinstall it has not been made.
Sabrina Singh, a Pentagon spokeswoman, acknowledged that she does not know when the pier will be reinstalled.
She also said on Friday that there is a need for more aid to come into Cyprus and be transported to the pier.
She said that the secure area onshore is “pretty close to full” but that the intention is still to get aid into Gaza by all means necessary. She said the US is having discussions with the aid agencies about the distribution of the food.
The UN, which has the widest reach in delivering aid to starving Palestinians, on June 9 paused the distribution of food and other emergency supplies that had arrived through the pier.
The pause came after the Israeli military used an area near the pier to fly out rescued hostages after a raid that killed more than 270 Palestinians, prompting a UN security review over concerns that aid workers’ safety and neutrality may have compromised.
UN World Food Programme spokesman Steve Taravella said on Friday that the UN participation in the pier project is still on pause pending resolution of the security concerns.
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