High seas and low maintenance: Inside the turbulent US effort to build a pier into Gaza

Hours after President Joe Biden touted its success during his commencement speech at West Point last Saturday, White House staffers learned that the temporary pier the military had just constructed into Gaza was falling apart. Four Army vessels had been beached, two in Gaza and two along the coast of Israel.

Hours after President Joe Biden touted the success of the temporary pier the military had just constructed into Gaza during his commencement speech at West Point last Saturday, White House staffers learned the pier was at risk of falling apart. By Tuesday, heavy seas and a surprise North African storm had beached four Army vessels and caused enough damage that the whole thing had to be towed to Israel for repairs. “We were all disappointed,” a senior administration official told CNN, adding that up until it broke apart, the pier had performed well enough that officials were preparing to increase the amount of aid delivered over it. The pier represents months of work by officials trying to come up with a way to get aid into Gaza without dropping it out of planes or trucking it through border checkpoints. Even though it was operational for only about a week, the pier helped deliver some 1,000 metric tons of aid into Gaza before breaking apart. That’s well short of the military’s goal of moving 500 tons of aid per day over the pier. And delays initially stalled distribution of what did make it into Gaza. The pier also came with a significant price tag of $320 million and required 1,000 US military personnel to complete before breaking apart last week. But with air drops having ceased in recent weeks, and the land route into Rafah currently closed, the pier remains a potential lifeline for thousands of Gazans facing a humanitarian crisis.