Opinion Article: Plan to Encourage Palestinian Emigration to Europe and Complete Closure of the Rafah Crossing! Ambiguity and Contradictions in the American Port Project in Gaza

The establishment of a temporary dock, as the US administration announces, may take weeks to build, and airlift operations do not provide a solution. The real solution is to stop the war lift Israel’s siege on Gaza and reopen its crossings.

Undoubtedly, Biden’s deceptive speech constituted a rare acknowledgment of the scale of Palestinian suffering in Gaza due to the Israeli military aggression when he said, “This war has caused severe losses to innocent civilians compared to all previous wars in Gaza combined.” He added: “More than 30,000 Palestinians have been killed, most of whom are not from the resistance,” forgetting that they were killed with American weapons and under American political, economic, and military cover.

The problem is not in the aid Biden speaks of, and the crisis in Gaza, where the crisis can be solved only by increasing aid, but we need a ceasefire and ending the suffering completely.

This maritime corridor does not meet Gaza’s basic needs, as people need to live normally like any other people in the world, so establishing a port in Gaza will not change the reality.

President Biden’s idea of establishing a seaport in the Gaza Strip raises significant questions about its implementation mechanisms and the real hidden objectives behind it, especially as it comes amid the worsening suffering of the population due to famine caused by the blockade imposed on the Strip and the continued Israeli aggression for more than 155 days.

Ambiguity and Contradictions

This proposal is still ambiguous and raises many questions, especially at this time, it needs a lot of details about the port’s tasks, management, and the Israeli occupation’s stance on it, while it carries many incomprehensible, unjustified, and unexplained contradictions.

At the same time, the resistance previously requested, during the ongoing siege on Gaza, which lasted more than 17 years, to build a maritime port to and from the Gaza Strip to overcome the problems in the crossings, but this request was always rejected.

Despite the “humanitarian aspect” of what Biden announced, there is another aspect of the floating port related to encouraging voluntary Palestinian migration to Europe and cancelling any role for the Rafah land crossing on the border with Egypt.

In contrast, observers believe that entering Gaza through humanitarian aid and alleviating the suffering of the population is an integrated program belonging to an American-Israeli vision, shared by Arab parties, which is the second stage after severe starvation by imposing a mechanism under American sponsorship to address the hunger crisis to neutralize Hamas’s role in the sector.

In this regard, if food, in particular, is intensively and systematically introduced, it will not be an easy gateway to implement their plan to gradually remove Hamas from the equation.

In the case of hunger, you cannot prevent people from eating, nor can you stand in the way of their relief, but the truth is that this port or maritime corridor is not what Hamas demanded to break the siege on the Gaza Strip, and the American port may be another tool to tighten the blockade on the Palestinians.

The United States will not allow any presence of the movement and its institutions in the port mechanism, as it is a direct tool to tighten control over people through starvation and then feeding.

Not a Solution to the Humanitarian Crisis

According to US statements, the maritime bridge needs weeks to operate, as the US Department of Defense, the Pentagon, announced that the process of building the floating port would take 60 days and will likely involve more than a thousand soldiers, and according to European estimates, it can transport the equivalent of only 200 trucks per day.

Analysts believe that the port in this form does not meet half of the sector’s daily needs and does not constitute a radical solution to the humanitarian crisis, while the solution lies in exerting sufficient pressure on the occupying state to introduce aid by land in the appropriate amount.

On the other hand, the United States fears the repercussions of the deterioration of humanitarian conditions in the sector, due to its potential impact on its interests and forces in the region and around the world.

Strategically, human rights issues have been a key tool for American foreign policy, justifying military interventions and economic sanctions against many countries worldwide, and fears the impact of its silence and complicity with the occupation’s crimes in Gaza on the effectiveness of this strategic tool in its future policy.

In contrast, the Israeli government does not show sufficient understanding of this American need and focuses instead on efforts to displace the population in the northern sector negotiating pressure on the resistance using the weapon of starvation, and placing obstacles in the way of delivering aid by land, to undermine the presence of any civilian authority, and thus undermining the elements of life, cohesion, and resilience in the sector.

In the face of this situation, the US administration finds it necessary to intervene directly to protect its immediate and strategic interests, and it also sees a real interest for the Israeli state in it, even if Netanyahu’s government does not appreciate it properly.

And here I wonder: Is the maritime bridge enough, or will aid be dropped on Gaza from the air until the United States feels comfortable? How does this align while this same power arms the occupation and compensates it with ammunition and weapons?! How does this align while this same power alone has the power to stop the war by exerting real pressure on the occupation and its leaders? The stark truth is that the occupation used starvation, and what prevented aid and hindered it was nothing but to subdue the Palestinian people in Gaza and blackmail the resistance.

How shameful it is for these major powers in the world to see children dying of hunger and do nothing!