New routes planned for halted Gaza aid from US-built pier

The United Nations has planned new routes within the Gaza Strip to transport aid from a US-built floating pier after crowds of desperate Palestinians intercepted 11 trucks, causing a halt to deliveries that continued for a third day on Tuesday.

The temporary pier was anchored to a Gaza beach last Thursday as Israel comes under growing global pressure to allow more supplies into the besieged coastal enclave, where it is at war with Hamas and famine looms.

Operations began on Friday and 10 aid trucks were driven by UN contractors to a World Food Program warehouse in Deir El Balah in Gaza. But on Saturday, only five trucks made it to the warehouse after 11 others were intercepted.

“Crowds had stopped the trucks at various points along the way. There was … what I think I would refer to as self-distribution,” UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric told reporters in New York today.

“These trucks were traveling through areas where there’d been no aid. I think people feared that they would never see aid. They grabbed what they could,” he said.

Distribution was paused as the UN planned new routes and coordination of deliveries in a bid to prevent more aid being intercepted, said Abeer Etefa, a WFP spokesperson in Cairo.

“The missions were planned for today using the new routes to avoid the crowds,” she said. Dujarric later said there had been no transportation of aid from the pier since Saturday.

US officials have said that once up and running the pier would initially handle 90 trucks a day, but that number could go to 150 trucks. The UN has said at least 500 trucks a day are needed to enter Gaza.