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| Israel-Palestine-Jordan |
| Sources Say Joe Biden's Gaza Pier Is Endangering Troops' Lives for a 'Photo-Op' |
| 2024-06-13 |
| [Breitbart] The Biden administration has publicly praised American troops who are part of the risky mission to deliver aid to Gaza via a temporary pier, but behind the scenes, sources tell Breitbart News that the troops’ safety is being endangered for a “photo-op.” There are approximately 1,000 troops who are part of the novel operation to attach a floating pier to the coast of Gaza. The pier went operational on May 17, but eight days later on May 25, it broke apart due to heavy seas and had to be dismantled from the coast and repaired. It was reattached just last week. Despite this, the Biden administration has insisted the pier operation has been a success. “The operation was going successfully,” Deputy Defense Secretary Sabrina Singh said on May 30. But sources say behind the scenes, troops’ lives are being put at risk, sometimes for literal photo-ops. One U.S. source involved in the mission said the pier has been targeted daily. “[There] absolutely has been gunfire and mortars. It’s all day and night nonstop,” the source said. Indeed, due to the risk of sniper-fire, troops are ordered to wear tactical vests as far as five nautical miles out from the coast, and aid has to be rushed off the boats onto the temporary pier due to the “constant” attempts to attack the pier, according to the source. Yet, minutes before the first boat filled with aid hit the pier, troops were ordered to roll up plastic covers on the trucks so that the aid could be photographed, the source said. Troops were also ordered to wash the aid trucks and sweep flour off of them so that they look good in photos. The source said this happened twice — once for the first delivery of the operation, and again recently after the pier was reattached. The Biden administration has also boasted about the amount of aid moved over the pier — a little more than 2,000 metric tons to date, or approximately 4.6 million pounds. But sources say moving that amount of aid has taken a toll on troops. Two U.S. sources said commanders are ordering troops to work 12 to 48-hour shifts with very little sleep so that they can move more pallets, which has led to “many accidents,” including one service member being “crushed” by a forklift. The first U.S. source said it was lack of sleep that led to the service member being run and crushed over by an unlicensed forklift driver during night operations. Biden administration officials have revealed little about that injury, with Singh only saying that it was a “noncombat injury that happened on a ship that was away from the pier.” They recently acknowledged that the service member is in critical condition, and was recently moved along with his family from a hospital in Israel to the Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas. According to the U.S. source, the service member is “currently brain dead in a coma.” Breitbart News reached out to the 7th Transportation Brigade — Expeditionary to confirm the service member’s injuries and status, but did not receive a response. The Pentagon has acknowledged two other service members being injured, calling them “minor” injuries. However, the second U.S. source said troops are “being injured daily and not being taken off the mission.” “Someone dislocated their shoulder [and is] still being forced to work,” the source said. “Others are getting injuries [and are] still just being ignored because they just want this mission to show as a ‘success.’ It’s a disaster.” In addition, the sources said troops were getting “barely more than two meals a day,” with some getting only one meal a day, consisting of cucumber sandwiches. The first U.S. source said this is because “chow hours” do not match up with the shift hours, and some locations troops are working at do not have meals prepared for them. Sources also said troops are unable to shower or do laundry for days. “I just feel like priorities of a [command sergeant major] and brigade commander are not in the right places. It’s push aid whatever you have to do, I don’t care what it takes and not how can we push aid safely,” said the first U.S. source. They also said some sailors attached to Army vessels who were offloading aid at a pier in Israel were left at the pier overnight due to bad weather, and were forced to sleep in tents on the pier. One of the sources said the pier breaking apart could have been avoided if commanders had listened to troops’ warnings. “Army Mariners and Warrant Officers who know the Army watercraft field and capabilities of the equipment warned the generals and field grade officers days before the weather got bad out there and they needed to go to a safe haven with the boats and Trident pier,” the source said. “The brigade commander and higher shut it down and less than 18 hours later it resulted in damage of the Trident pier breaking apart, vessels becoming beached, some vessels sinking and one of them sitting at the ocean floor resulting in wasting millions in taxpayer dollars and halting aid,” the source said. Despite the weather being an ongoing concern, there is also currently no changes to how the mission will operate. Related: Temporary pier: 2024-06-09 US intelligence helped the IDF free four hostages but floating pier not involved, IDF sez no other hostages harmed Temporary pier: 2024-06-05 Biden Says He'll Help Africa 'Build Back Better' in a Second Term Temporary pier: 2024-05-24 $320 Million Mistake-Pentagon says none of the aid unloaded from US pier off coast of Gaza has been delivered to broader Palestinian population |
| Posted by:Skidmark |
| #6 #5...that they think is foreign policy! |
| Posted by: NoMoreBS 2024-06-13 13:17 |
| #5 Not just a photo-op, a half billion photo-op, because the imbecilic children that craft the "policies" and initiatives of this administration have no regard for the taxpayers wallet or the soldiers lives, that are play-pieces in the "big game" they this is foreign policy. |
| Posted by: NoMoreBS 2024-06-13 13:15 |
| #4 Typical politician. Using our troops bodies up to look better. |
| Posted by: DarthVader 2024-06-13 09:41 |
| #3 I originally thought that the Hezbollah folks would target this little endeavor. They might have planned to, but figured out rather quickly that there was no need for them to expend their ammo. |
| Posted by: Mullah Richard 2024-06-13 06:40 |
| #2 Come on, dock a fleet of ships and start relocating Gazans right away. It is time to end this. |
| Posted by: Cromonter Spawn of the Faeries8107 2024-06-13 02:38 |
| #1 Rocky waters: The multiple challenges faced by the US's lofty aid pier plans - WSJ |
| Posted by: Grom the Reflective 2024-06-13 02:11 |