President Joe Biden will announce during his State of the Union address his decision to have the U.S. military build a port in the Mediterranean Sea to increase the amount of humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip, according to senior administration officials.
“This port, the main feature of which is a temporary pier, will provide the capacity for hundreds of additional truckloads of assistance each day,” a senior administration official previewed to reporters on Thursday. “We will coordinate with the Israelis on its security requirements on land and work with the U.N. and humanitarian NGOs on the distribution of assistance within Gaza.”
It will take “a number of weeks to plan and execute,” the official added, noting that the initial shipments will be enabled by the United States and come from Cyprus. The plan includes U.S. troops staying on military vessels offshore but does not involve them going ashore to install the pier or causeway facility.
It is not yet clear how the aid will be distributed, though the U.S. will be working with the United Nations and other humanitarian partners to devise a strategy, the official said.
The announcement is one facet of the Biden administration’s multi-pronged approach to help the more than two million Gaza residents desperate for aid. The U.S. will be providing aid by land, air, and sea once the port is built and operational.
“We’re not waiting on the Israelis,” a second senior administration official said. “This is a moment for American leadership. And we are building a coalition of countries to address this urgent need.”
U.S. officials have said getting aid to Gaza by land is the most efficient, though they are using these alternative methods to supplement the desperately needed aid.
The U.S. has dropped more than 110,000 meals aerially into Gaza this week.
Gen. Erik Michael Kurilla, Commander of U.S. Central Command, told senators on the Armed Services Committee that it is hardest to get aid to northern Gaza, where the Israelis are no longer operating. The population in northern Gaza is roughly 300,000, down from more than 1.4 million before the war began, he said.
“The challenge is the security and distribution internal to Gaza,” Kurilla explained.
The Israeli military campaign in Gaza began with operations in the north, and the Israel Defense Forces urged civilians to evacuate south. As the Israelis completed those operations, they began to move south, as did the civilian population.
The first administration official said the Israelis, at their request, will be opening a third crossing from Israel into Gaza, this one in the northern part of the strip.
Much of the Gaza population is now concentrated in the southern part of the strip in Rafah, which is a city along the Egyptian border. Israeli military officials have said they need to carry out operations in the city to complete the objective of destroying Hamas’s ranks and military capabilities.
However, Hamas strategically locates itself within and underneath Gaza’s densest civilian locations to increase the likelihood of civilian casualties, though that does not obfuscate Israel’s responsibilities to protect those civilians in harm’s way.
International entities and a long list of governments, including the U.S., have warned about grave civilian casualties if Israel does not adequately account for the more than 1 million people seeking refuge in Rafah.
The Hamas-controlled Gaza health ministry has reported that more than 30,000 people have been killed in the war, though that figure does not distinguish between civilians and combatants.
The U.S., Qatar, and Egypt have spent months acting as mediators between Israel and Hamas, trying to reach a second ceasefire agreement to no avail yet. The first ceasefire deal lasted a week and took place in mid-November 2023. During that period, more than 100 of the roughly 253 people Hamas took hostage during its Oct. 7 terrorist attack that prompted the war were released. None have been released since then.
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Six Americans are still believed to be held by Hamas in Gaza. The families of some of the hostages, saved in that first deal and still held, will be in attendance for Biden’s third State of the Union address.
U.S. officials are pursuing a deal that would include a cessation of fighting for six weeks, which would allow for a surge in much-needed humanitarian aid in exchange for the release of the hostages. They have said Israel has agreed to the framework, and the onus is on Hamas to do the same, but Hamas officials have disagreed and blamed Israel.
