A temporary dock off the coast of Gaza to distribute more massively and more quickly the humanitarian aid that the Palestinian population urgently needs. This is what the United States intends to build, as Joe Biden will announce this evening (in the Italian evening). The White House had anticipated this, a few hours after the State of the Union speech that the American president traditionally delivers to Congress in a joint session. U.S. administration officials have so far only given initial details of the project. Biden will launch an “emergency military mission” to install a temporary dock – they indicated – capable of accommodating large cargo ships carrying food, water, medicine and temporary shelter inside the Gaza strip. An unprecedented and “spectacular” mission announced a few days after the equally unprecedented launch of urgent food packages from the skies of Gaza via three US Air Force C-130s. This is a very clear signal both to Israel and to that part of American public opinion, relevant within the Democratic Party, which accuses Biden of doing too little to end the war in Gaza. The military mission was agreed with a group of “allies and humanitarian partners in the Middle East and Europe,” the White House said. The lack of reference to Israel is significant, as it may therefore not have been informed of or involved in the operation. Biden “examined all options and did not want to wait for Israel,” the officials themselves confirmed with rare harshness.
American soldiers a stone's throw from the Gaza Strip
It is unclear where exactly the new floating port will be built, but it appears that it will first be built aboard U.S. Navy ships and then placed in the destination sea area, close to the coast. According to New York Times, the operation is expected to last a few weeks, involving “hundreds, if not thousands, of American troops aboard ships just off the coast” of Gaza. “No boots on the ground“, were quick to point out the same White House officials who had anticipated the news: that is to say that no American soldier will set foot on the soil of the Gaza Strip where the war is in progress. Respect the limits of the mandate for action on which Biden has been clear since the start of the new post-October 7 crisis. But also because if this were to happen, American and Israeli soldiers would risk finding themselves face to face, engaged in two completely different, even opposing, types of missions. With incalculable risks. In any case, it seems they will be a few hundred meters away. As narrow as the now sidereal one that separates the White House of Joe Biden from the government of Benjamin Netanyahu and his agenda.
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