The infrastructure, which is being built by the U.S. military, will allow aid workers to deliver food, treat children who are at risk of starving to death and provide other urgent assistance.

The head of USAID told The Associated Press that the increase in aid deliveries via the U.S.-backed sea route is expected to be gradual, as aid groups test distribution and security arrangements for aid workers.

The comments, made on condition of anonymity, were the first public accounting of the status of preparations to carry out the Biden administration’s $320 million port project.

With the Israel-Hamas war approaching its seventh month and Israel restricting the entry of humanitarian aid, half of the Gaza Strip’s 2.3 million people are at imminent risk of hunger.

Under international pressure, Israeli leaders have begun slowly reopening some crossings in recent weeks to allow some humanitarian aid in.

But the aid that will come in by sea, once the port is operational, will reach only a fraction — about half a million — of those in Gaza who need help.

Aid organizations, including USAID, have stressed that a major increase in food assistance through land crossings is essential to stave off famine in the territory.

Children under the age of 5 are among the first to die when war, drought or other emergencies disrupt access to food.

Hospital directors in Gaza reported the first starvation deaths in early March, mostly of infants.

Acute malnutrition rates among children under 5 have climbed from 1% before the war to 30% five months later, the USAID official said.

The increase in hunger has been the most rapid in recent history, outpacing that seen in other conflict and famine situations, such as Somalia or South Sudan.

One of the few functioning hospitals in northern Gaza, Kamal Adwan hospital, has been overwhelmed by parents bringing severely malnourished children for treatment, the official said.

Aid workers believe there are many more malnourished children in need who have not been identified and reached because families are unable to transport them past checkpoints and fighting.

Saving the children most in need of food will require both a significant increase in aid deliveries and an extended truce, the USAID official said, so that aid workers can set up feeding and treatment facilities across the territory and families can safely bring children for the extended treatment they need.

Read Also: Ataque israelita a Rafah causaria danos "além do aceitável" (Portuguese version)