Four people, including a teenage girl, have died in Gaza after walls collapsed onto their tents during severe overnight rainfall and strong winds, hospital authorities confirmed on Tuesday. The fatalities highlight the precarious living conditions across the Palestinian territory, which has been grappling with the aftermath of more than two years of devastating Israeli bombardment and persistent aid shortfalls.
Shifa hospital, Gaza City’s largest medical facility, received the casualties and identified the deceased as two women, a 15-year-old girl, and a 72-year-old man. One of the women was killed when a wall fell onto her tent in the western part of the city. In a separate, incident along the Mediterranean shore of Gaza City, the other woman, the teenager, and the elderly man, all from the same family, died under a collapsed wall. At least five other individuals were injured in this second collapse.
Despite a ceasefire being in effect since 10 October, aid groups have consistently warned that many Gazans lack the necessary shelter to withstand the frequent and harsh winter storms that plague the region.
In the central town of Zawaida, Associated Press images showed inundated tents Tuesday morning with people trying to rebuild their shelters.
Yasmin Shalha, a displaced woman from the northern town of Beit Lahiya, stood against winds that caused the tarps of tents to flap around her as she stitched hers back together with needle and thread. She said that it had fallen on top of her family the night before, as they slept.
“The winds were very, very strong. The tent collapsed over us,” the mother of five told the AP as she was sewing a sheet torn apart by the winds. “As you can see, our situation is dire.”
Mohamed al-Sawalha, a 72-year-old man from the northern refugee camp of Jabaliya, criticized the conditions that most Gazans endure.
“It doesn’t work neither in summer nor in winter,” he said of the tent. “We left behind houses and buildings (with) doors that could be opened and closed. Now we live in a tent. Even sheep don’t live like we do.”
The majority of Palestinians live in makeshift tents since their homes were reduced to rubble during the war. When storms now strike the territory, Palestinian rescue workers warn people against seeking shelter inside damaged buildings, saying they could fall down on top of them.
Aid groups say not enough shelter materials are entering Gaza during the truce.
Israel’s bombing campaign has reduced entire neighborhoods to rubble and half-standing structures. Residents aren’t able to return to their homes in Israeli-controlled areas of the Gaza Strip.
The Palestinian territory’s population of more than 2 million people have been struggling to keep the cold weather, including rain and severe storms, at bay, amid shortage of humanitarian aid and Israel’s ban of caravans that are badly needed during the winter months. It’s the third winter since the war between Israel and Hamas started on Oct. 7, 2023, when militants stormed into southern Israel and killed around 1,200 people and abducted 251 into Gaza.
As of Monday, at least six children as young as seven days, died of hypothermia since the start of winter, according to the health ministry.
The ministry, part of the Hamas-run government, said that 442 people were killed by Israeli fire and their bodies brought to hospitals since the ceasefire went into effect just over three months ago. The ministry maintains detailed casualty records that are seen as generally reliable by U.N. agencies and independent experts.
