Gaza aid pier ready in two to three weeks, US says

The White House said Sunday that a US-made pier meant to boost aid to Gaza will become operational in a few weeks but cannot replace land routes with trucks as the best way to feed people in the territory.

Israel's nearly seventh-month war on Gaza has triggered a humanitarian crisis, and it faces growing pressure to enable more aid deliveries as the UN warns famine is imminent.

The Pentagon said last week that the US military had begun building a pier meant to speed up aid deliveries.

"It will take probably two to three weeks before we can really see an operation," White House national security spokesman John Kirby said Sunday on ABC News.

Kirby said the floating platform to bring more food and other essentials into Gaza will help, but has its limits.

"Nothing can replace, quite frankly, nothing can replace the ground routes and the trucks that are getting in," Kirby said.

After the killing of seven aid workers in an Israel strike on April 1, which drew international outrage, President Joe Biden bluntly told Israel to change the way it is waging the war.

He said it was imperative that Israel let in more aid and take more pains to avoid Palestinian civilian casualties.

Biden said continued US aid to Israel would depend on such changes being made.

Kirby said Israel is now in fact letting in more trucks, including in the particularly hard-hit north of Gaza.

"The Israelis have started to meet the commitments that President Biden asked them to meet," he said.

The US finally admits Gaza is starving, but here's why Biden’s floating pier plan is, at best, a stunt 👇https://t.co/mhGGFMtvf2

— The New Arab (@The_NewArab) March 21, 2024

Plans for the pier were first announced by Biden in early March, as Israel was holding up aid deliveries on land.

The United States, Israel's main ally and weapons supplier, has expressed growing public frustration with Israel over its conduct of the Gaza war.

The war began with Hamas' October 7 attack, which resulted in the deaths of about 1,170 people in Israel, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures. Hamas said the attack it led was in retaliation to decades of Israeli occupation and aggression against the Palestinian people, including the Gaza blockade.

Israel's unprecedented air and ground offensive has killed at least 34,454 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory.