The U.S. military confirmed Wednesday that it is giving up on trying to salvage the ill-fated floating pier project meant to deliver crucial humanitarian assistance to Palestinian civilians inside the Gaza Strip.
The decision, announced by Vice Adm. Brad Cooper, deputy commander of U.S. Central Command, marks the end of a troubled mission that endured near-constant setbacks, including bad weather and maintenance challenges. Critics immediately said the Biden administration had little to show for the $230 million invested in the high-profile project.
“Our assessment is that the temporary pier has achieved its intended effect to surge a very high volume of aid into Gaza and ensure that the aid reaches the civilians in Gaza in a quick manner,” Adm. Cooper told Pentagon reporters. “We’re not ‘mission complete’ and transitioning to a new phase.”
In March, President Biden ordered the Defense Department to begin setting up the floating pier. At the time, he faced sharp global criticism for not doing more to restrain Israel’s response to the Hamas terrorist rampage of Oct. 7 that resulted in the deaths of more than 1,200 people, mostly civilians. The United Nations and other international groups were warning that Gaza residents, facing a war and a near-total economic blockade, were on the brink of famine.
Crews finished construction and installation of the floating pier in May. Although it was only intermittently operational, it facilitated the delivery of nearly 20 million pounds of humanitarian assistance, Adm. Cooper said.
“It’s the highest volume of humanitarian assistance that the U.S. military has ever delivered into the Middle East,” he said.
Many were not buying the Pentagon’s rosy assessment.
Sen. Roger F. Wicker of Mississippi, the top Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee, called the Gaza pier a “national embarrassment” and said he was glad the Pentagon finally pulled the plug on it.
“The only miracle is that this doomed-from-the-start operation did not cost any American lives,” Mr. Wicker said in a statement. “I’ve been calling for an end to this election-year gimmick since its prime-time inception at the State of the Union.”
Although senior military officials may be bullish about how the Gaza pier ultimately fared, President Biden wasn’t so enthusiastic. He conceded publicly in recent days that the operation had not met his expectations.
“I’ve been disappointed that some of the things that I’ve put forward have not succeeded as well, like the port we attached from Cyprus,” Mr. Biden said at a press conference. “I was hopeful that would be more successful.”
Mr. Wicker said the $230 million allotted for the Gaza pier was “needlessly spent” and insisted that “significant questions” would be asked about the Biden administration’s planning for the mission.
“It took roughly double the amount of time to transport the pier than for the duration when the pier was actually in use,” Mr. Wicker said in his statement. “The $230 million used to deploy the pier could have instead been used to purchase more than 1,200 Coyote counter-drone interceptors to keep U.S. troops safe in Iraq and Syria.”
Adm. Cooper insisted that the pier provided an essential supplemental route for humanitarian aid into Gaza at a critical time when other routes weren’t available.
“If not delivered via the pier, this critical aid would likely not have been able to reach the people of Gaza in acute need. I think this is really important context,” he said.
The floating pier will be replaced with “Pier 28,” a dedicated facility at the Israeli port of Ashdod, about 40 miles south of Tel Aviv, U.S. and Israeli officials said. Aid coming in through that entry port will need to use Israeli land crossings.
“The Ashdod maritime corridor offers a more sustainable path,” Adm. Cooper said. “In the past few weeks, we began utilizing this new hybrid pathway, from the sea and land, to deliver aid from Cyprus, to the port of Ashdod, Israel, then into North Gaza.”
The floating pier remains in Ashdod. It will be brought back to the U.S., but Adm. Cooper declined to comment on any further uses for the structure, citing security concerns.
Humanitarian aid groups said the U.S. instead should have pressured Israel to open more land crossings for deliveries to the densely populated, war-torn Palestinian enclave. The sea around the port was shallow, the weather uncooperative, and the presence of Israeli soldiers near the distribution point added to security concerns.
The Associated Press reported that the pier operated for less than 25 days after its installation on May 16. Aid agencies used it only about half that time because of security concerns.
Jeremy Konyndyk, president of Refugees International, told the publication the New Humanitarian that the pier was a “boondoggle from start to finish.”
• Mike Glenn can be reached at mglenn@washingtontimes.com.