U.S. to remove Gaza aid pier due to weather and may not put it back, officials say (2024)

Here are the latest updates from day 266 of the war:

■ The Washington Post reports that, during his last visit to the United States, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant discussed with senior U.S. officials a joint plan for the so-called day after in the Gaza Strip.

■ The Israeli army says that forces of the target intelligence unit 869 have detected Hezbollah members in a military structure near the southern Lebanon village of Kfar Kila. The forces directed Israeli fighter jets who struck the compound and destroyed it.

■ The amphibious assault ship USS Wasp entered the eastern Mediterranean Sea this week as the United States positions warships to try to keep fighting between Israel and Hezbollah from escalating into a wider war.

■ State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said that Secretary of State Antony Blinken met on Thursday with UN Senior Humanitarian and Reconstruction Coordinator for Gaza Sigrid Kaag in Washington, DC.

■ According to Hamas sources, the exchange of gunfire in Gaza City occurs in the Shujaiya and Tuffah neighborhoods.

■ The IDF said it struck targets in Hezbollah's air defense system, from which surface-to-air missiles were launched at an Israel Air Force aircraft.

■ The pier built by the U.S. military to bring aid to Gaza has been removed due to weather to protect it, and the U.S. is considering not re-installing it unless the aid begins flowing out into the population again, several U.S. officials said Friday.

■ The Israeli army says that three Hezbollah drones have infiltrated Israel from southern Lebanon and exploded in the Western Galilee after interception attempts failed.

■ Iran has installed half the advanced uranium-enriching machines it said earlier this month it would quickly add to its Fordow site dug into a mountain, but has not yet brought them online, the UN nuclear watchdog said in a report seen by Reuters.

■ Iran's Mission to UN posted on X that if Israel should "embark on full-scale military aggression" in Lebanon, "an obliterating war will ensue. All options, including the full involvement of all Resistance Fronts, are on the table."

Iran's Mission to UN posted on X that if Israel should "embark on full-scale military aggression, an obliterating war will ensue. All options, including the full involvement of all Resistance Fronts, are on the table."

The Biden administration has sent to Israel large numbers of munitions, including more than 10,000 highly destructive 2,000-pound bombs and thousands of Hellfire missiles, since the start of the war in Gaza, said two U.S. officials briefed on an updated list of weapons shipments.

Between the war's start last October and recent days, the United States has transferred at least 14,000 of the MK-84 2,000-pound bombs, 6,500 500-pound bombs, 3,000 Hellfire precision-guided air-to-ground missiles, 1,000 bunker-buster bombs, 2,600 air-dropped small-diameter bombs, and other munitions, according to the officials, who were not authorized to speak publicly.

WASHINGTON — Former U.S. President Donald Trump accused Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of "becoming a Palestinian," one day after derisively accusing U.S. President Joe Biden of the same thing during Thursday's historic presidential debate.

"Look at a guy like Sen. Schumer, I've always known him and known him a long time. He's become a Palestinian, he's a Palestinian now. Congratulations," he told a rally in Virginia.

"He was very loyal to Israel and to Jewish people — he's Jewish — but he's become a Palestinian because they have a couple more votes or something. Nobody's quite figured it out," he added.

Schumer is the highest ranking Jewish elected official in American history. One of Israel's most historic defenders in Washington, he unprecedentedly called for early Israeli elections earlier this year over Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's conduct. He since joined fellow congressional leaders in inviting him to address a joint session of Congress.

Iran has installed half the advanced uranium-enriching machines it said earlier this month it would quickly add to its Fordow site dug into a mountain, but has not yet brought them online, the UN nuclear watchdog said in a report seen by Reuters.

Iran informed the International Atomic Energy Agency two weeks ago it would rapidly expand its enrichment capacity at Fordow by adding eight cascades, or clusters, of IR-6 centrifuges within three to four weeks.

Within two days, the IAEA had verified that two of the cascades had been installed. In a confidential report to member states on Friday, the agency said that number had now doubled.

"The Agency has verified that Iran has installed four of the aforementioned eight IR-6 cascades in Unit 1 at FFEP (Fordow Fuel Enrichment Plant)," the report said, adding that the verification was carried out on Sunday.

"Iran has not specified to the Agency when it would start feeding any of the cascades in Unit 1 with UF6 or the planned enrichment level," it added, referring to uranium hexafluoride gas, the feedstock for centrifuges.

Diplomats said the addition of the IR-6 machines was a response to a resolution against Iran by the IAEA's 35-nation Board of Governors, calling on Tehran to step up cooperation with the watchdog and reverse its recent barring of inspectors.

The United States announced new sanctions targeting Iran's oil trade on Thursday, saying it was acting in response to "steps (by Iran) to further expand its nuclear program in ways that have no credible peaceful purpose".

The report also said Iran had carried out a process called passivation, which involves feeding UF6 into centrifuges in preparation for enrichment without accumulating enriched uranium, on three cascades of IR-2m centrifuges and three cascades of IR-4 machines at its underground Natanz plant.

Moshe Davidovich, head of the northern Mateh Asher Regional Council, said following the rocket and drone attack by Hezbollah earlier on Friday that "While the Israeli government is making an utmost effort to reach an agreement [with Hezbollah] in the north, Nasrallah is once again proving that he's the sovereign."

"Our families, who were gathered around the Shabbat table, were once again forced to hide in the security rooms," he added.

The Israeli army says that three Hezbollah drones have infiltrated Israel from southern Lebanon and exploded in the Western Galilee after interception attempts failed.

According to the army's statement, 25 rockets were also launched into the Western Galilee and the Galilee Panhandle. No casualties were reported, but several fires were ignited.

The army retaliated by artillery fire to the launch sources, the statement added.

The pier built by the U.S. military to bring aid to Gaza has been removed due to weather to protect it, and the U.S. is considering not re-installing it unless the aid begins flowing out into the population again, several U.S. officials said Friday.

While the military has helped deliver desperately needed food through the pier, the vast majority of it is still sitting in the adjacent storage yard because of the difficulty that agencies have had moving it to areas in Gaza where it is most needed, and that storage area is almost full.

The pier has been used to get more than 19.4 million pounds, or 8.6 million kilograms, of food into Gaza but has faced multiple setbacks. Rough seas damaged the pier just days into its initial operations, forcing the military to remove it temporarily for repairs and then reinstall it.

U.S. officials said the military could reinstall the pier once the bad weather passes in the coming days, but the final decision on whether to reinstall it hasn't been made.

Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh acknowledged that she doesn't know when the pier will be reinstalled.
She said Friday that there is a need for more aid to come into Cyprus and be transported to the pier. Singh noted that the secure area onshore is "pretty close to full," but that the intention is still to get aid into Gaza by all means necessary.

The big challenge has been that humanitarian convoys have stopped carrying the aid from the pier's storage area further into Gaza, to get it into civilian hands, because they have come under attack.