Effort To Send Gaza Aid By Sea Is Moving Ahead. But The First Ship Is Still In Cyprus.

DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — A U.S. Army vessel carrying equipment for building a temporary pier in Gaza was on its way to the Mediterranean on Sunday, three days after U.S. President Joe Biden announced plans to increase aid deliveries by sea to the besieged enclave where hundreds of thousands of Palestinians are going hungry.

The new push for aid came in the final hours before the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which could start as early as Sunday evening, depending on the sighting of a crescent moon. Hopes for a new cease-fire by Ramadan faded days ago with negotiations apparently stalled.

The opening of the sea corridor, along with airdrops by the U.S., Jordan and others, showed growing alarm over Gaza’s deadly humanitarian crisis and a new willingness to bypass Israeli control over land shipments. Israel said that it welcomed the sea deliveries and would inspect Gaza-bound cargo before it leaves a staging area in nearby Cyprus.

But aid officials say that air and sea deliveries can’t make up for a shortage of supply routes on land. The daily number of aid trucks entering Gaza by land over the past five months has been far below the 500 that entered before the war.

A ship belonging to Spanish aid group Open Arms and carrying 200 tons of food aid was expected to make a pilot voyage to test the corridor “as soon as possible,” said spokesperson Linda Roth with partner organization World Central Kitchen. The ship remained at Cyprus’ port of Larnaca in what Roth called “a quickly evolving and fluid situation.”

Biden stepped up public criticism of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, saying he believes that Netanyahu is “hurting Israel more than helping Israel” in his approach to the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, now