Following extensive repairs in Ashdod, the US temporary aid pier in Gaza went back into action on Saturday, only to be closed again a day later due to rough waters, reported the Wall Street Journal on Wednesday. This epitomizes the pier’s rocky journey so far, breaking apart and partially sinking only ten days into its operation in late May.
Citing two Pentagon officials, the Washington Post estimated the cost of the repairs at $22 million.
As of Tuesday, the pier was once more open for aid, but the WSJ reports that multiple issues are impeding the success of "ambitious” plan to provide Gaza with aid via sea.
The pier, constructed at a cost of $230 million off the Gazan coastline, was intended to provide an alternative to land aid distribution, given the then-upcoming IDF military advancement into Rafah, as well as the closure of two border crossings in the south of Gaza, reports WSJ.
However, WSJ states that the “hastily constructed" maritime corridor was not equipped to withstand the roughness of the Mediterranean Sea, which worsens at this time of year. Nor, WSJ continues, were the logistics of transferring aid from pier to people fully considered.
Unused aid
Pallets of food now sit unused in huge warehouses, say WSJ, food intended to prevent the IPC-predicted famine among the Gazan population.
Each aid pallet is wrapped in black or clear cellophane to help protect them during them during their 36 hours sea transit. A majority of the 4,000 pallets that reached Gaza have sat in warehouses for weeks, yet to be delivered, says the report.
During his State of the Union address in March, President Biden said the pier “would enable a massive increase in the amount of humanitarian assistance getting into Gaza every day.” The pier, however, has only been used to bring in enough aid to feed Gazans for a few days.
The WSJ alleges that defense officials were not told of the plan before the speech, and were in a rush to assemble it. Soon, roughly 1,000 troops left Virginia’s shores in ships carrying parts of the pier.
1000 troops left Virginia to build the 1,800 long foot structure leading to the shore, but the WSJ says that the weather and maritime conditions were not accounted for.
Logistical issues
The Joint Logistics Over the Shore organization (JLOTS) says that the pier’s functioning is “weather-dependent,” and that it cannot work if the sea is above State 3, which is usually only found in a bay and involves small waves of between 0.50-1.25m.
The Mediterranean Sea is often at sea state 4, involving higher winds and waves 1.25–2.50. According to Israel Marine Data Center (ISRAMAR) the current sea state in the area is a 2, and is not predicted to be higher than a 3 for the next week.
Another challenge that the pier faced was coordination between the different parties involved - the US military, the Israeli military, the Cypriot government, and the US Agency for International Development – reported WSJ.
During a war, and with a short timeline, the ability of the different parties to come to work efficiently was compromised, especially given the fact that key details had not been finalized before the pier was built, such as how the US would ensure sufficient aid was reaching Cyprus.
Miki Peleg, general manager of EDT Offshore, a Cypriot cargo-ship company that was contracted by the US to remove the pier by tugboat, said: “We know the weather, and we know the rhythm of the waves and the wind at any time of year, and we could have told it was not going to work,” Other experts also claimed that the failure of the pier was “inevitable”, reports the WSJ.
When it reopened on June 7, Vice Adm. Brad Cooper, deputy commander, US Central Command, told reporters that “issues with the pier stemmed solely from unanticipated weather” and that the Pentagon expected to increase the level of humanitarian aid to higher than before it was closed the first time.
On Saturday, 1.1 million pounds of traveled from Cyprus to Gaza, however the WSJ cites a US defense official as saying “let’s see how long this lasts.”