President Joe Biden ordered the construction of a temporary pier to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza earlier this year even as some staffers for the U.S. Agency for International Development expressed concerns that the effort would be difficult to pull off and undercut the effort to persuade Israel to open “more efficient” land crossings to get food into the territory, according to a USAID inspector general report published Tuesday.
Biden announced plans to use the temporary pier in his State of the Union address in March to hasten the delivery of aid to the Palestinian territory besieged by war between Israel and Hamas.
But the $230 million military-run project known as the Joint Logistics Over-the-Shore system, or JLOTS, would only operate for about 20 days. Aid groups pulled out of the project by July, ending a mission plagued by repeated weather and security problems that limited how much food and other emergency supplies could get to starving Palestinians.
“Multiple USAID staff expressed concerns that the focus on using JLOTS would detract from the Agency’s advocacy for opening land crossings, which were seen as more efficient and proven methods of transporting aid into Gaza,” according to the inspector general report. “However, once the President issued the directive, the Agency’s focus was to use JLOTS as effectively as possible.”
At the time Biden announced plans for the floating pier, the United Nations was reporting virtually all of Gaza’s 2.3 million people were struggling to find food and more than a half-million were facing starvation.
The Biden administration set a goal of the U.S. sea route and pier providing food to feed 1.5 million of Gaza’s people for 90 days. It fell short, bringing in enough to feed about 450,000 people for a month before shutting down.
High waves and bad weather repeatedly damaged the pier, and the U.N. World Food Program ended cooperation with the project after an Israeli rescue operation used an area nearby to whisk away hostages, raising concerns about whether its workers would be seen as neutral and independent in the conflict.
U.S. National Security Council spokesman Sean Savett said Tuesday that the project “had a real impact” of getting food to hungry Palestinian civilians despite the obstacles.
“The bottom line is that given how dire the humanitarian situation in Gaza is, the United States has left no stone unturned in our efforts to get more aid in, and the pier played a key role at a critical time in advancing that goal,” Savett said in a statement.
