File photo -In this image provided by the U.S. Army, soldiers assigned to the 7th Transportation Brigade and sailors attached to the MV Roy P. Benavidez assemble the floating pier, off the shore of Gaza on April 26, 2024. AP
The US says that the pier -- which the military started building last month and which will cost at least $320 million -- is aimed at boosting deliveries of desperately needed humanitarian assistance to Gaza.
"As of today, the construction of the two portions of the JLOTS -- the floating pier and the Trident pier -- are complete and awaiting final movement offshore," Deputy Pentagon Press Secretary Sabrina Singh told journalists, using an acronym for Joint Logistics Over-the-Shore, the official name for the pier capability.
"Today there are still forecasted high winds and high sea swells, which are causing unsafe conditions for the JLOTS components to be moved. So the pier sections and military vessels involved in its construction are still positioned at the port of Ashdod," in Israel, Singh said.
US Central Command (CENTCOM) "stands by to move the pier into position in the near future," she added.
The vessels and the under-construction pier were moved to the port due to bad weather last week. Once the weather clears, the pier will be anchored to the Gaza shore by Israeli soldiers, keeping US troops off the ground.
The Pentagon announcement came just hours after Israel sent tanks into Rafah in southern Gaza, seizing the border crossing with Egypt in an operation the United Nations said denied it access to the key humanitarian passage.
Israel's long-threatened Rafah operation began hours after Hamas announced late Monday it had accepted a truce proposal, prompting cheering crowds to take to the streets -- despite Israel saying it was "far" from plans it had previously agreed to.
Netanyahu said that "within hours" of approving the operation, "our forces raised the Israeli flags at the Rafah crossing and took down the Hamas flags".
Gaza’s vital Rafah crossing remained closed early Wednesday. Associated Press journalists heard sporadic explosions and gunfire in the area overnight, including two large blasts early Wednesday.
Palestinian civilians in the southern Gazan city of Rafah voiced despair on Monday as Israel dropped fliers urging them to evacuate for their own "safety" ahead of a "limited" military operation.
Israel's army said it was ordering Palestinian families in eastern Rafah to flee in preparation for an expected ground assault on the city which abuts Gaza's border with Egypt.
Palestinians in Rafah described emerging outside after a terrifying night in which around a dozen air strikes were carried out on Rafah, to find fliers falling from the sky telling them to "evacuate immediately".
"The army is working with intensive power against the terrorist forces near you," read a flier circulated in eastern Rafah.
"For your safety, the IDF (Israeli military) tells you to evacuate immediately towards the expanded humanitarian zone of al-Mawasi," it said, with a map indicating the location to the north of Rafah.
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