🔗 Share this article

Powerful cold-season winds brought walls down upon fragile shelters housing Palestinians uprooted by conflict in Gaza, claiming the lives of no fewer than four individuals. This tragedy underscores the dangerous living conditions that continue after more than 24 months of devastating airstrikes and critical lack of aid.

Truce Provides Little Respite from Harsh Weather

While a ceasefire has been in effect from October, humanitarian organizations report that Palestinians do not have the adequate shelter required to survive frequent cold-weather events.

Medical staff at Gaza City's largest medical facility, which received the bodies, said on Tuesday that the deceased include a pair of adult females, a girl, and a man.

Separately, the local health authority announced on Tuesday that a 12-month-old infant died of extreme cold during the night.

"International actors has allowed us to witness loss of life in all its forms," said Bassel Hamouda after the burial. "It’s true the bombing may have temporarily stopped, but we have witnessed all imaginable reasons of death in the world in the Gaza Strip."

Relatives Buried in Shelter Collapse

As per Shifa hospital, 3 people of a one household — 72-year-old a man, his 15-year-old relative, and his daughter-in-law — were killed when an 26-foot tall wall collapsed onto their dwelling in a coastal area of Gaza City. No fewer than 5 others were injured in the incident.

Family members on Tuesday began removing the debris that had buried their loved ones and reconstructing the tent shelters for those who remained.

Aid Efforts and Ongoing Emergency

The UN and its humanitarian partners were distributing tents, plastic sheeting, blankets and clothes as well as food and hygiene supplies throughout Gaza, stated the relevant UN coordination body.

The majority of Palestinians live in improvised tents because their houses were turned into rubble over the course of the hostilities. Humanitarian organizations say not enough building supplies are entering Gaza under the ceasefire.

Fatality Numbers Since the Ceasefire

The Gaza health ministry, part of the administration, reports more than four hundred and forty people have been killed by gunfire and their remains taken to hospitals since the truce went into effect. The ministry maintains detailed fatality records that are considered largely accurate by UN agencies and outside analysts.

A spokesperson for UNICEF, spokesperson for the UN children’s agency Unicef, stated on that day that at least 100 children below eighteen years old – 60 males and forty girls – had been killed since the ceasefire started because of armed actions, such as drone strikes, airstrikes, tank shelling and use of live ammunition. Those figures, he explained, reflected cases where enough information had been gathered to warrant recording, but the overall count is believed to be higher. He added that hundreds of children had been wounded.

"While 'bombings and shootings have decreased' under the ceasefire, they have not ceased," the spokesperson told reporters at a UN briefing in Geneva by video link from the Strip. "Therefore what the world now calls quiet would be viewed as a crisis in any other place," he concluded.

Another Winter of Hardship

Gaza’s residents of more than 2 million individuals has been struggling to keep the freezing temperatures and storms at bay while enduring shortages of humanitarian aid and a lack of more substantial transitional shelter, which is urgently required throughout the winter months. This marks the third cold season after the conflict between Israel and Hamas began on 7 October 2023, when militants attacked southern Israel and killed approximately twelve hundred people and abducted two hundred and fifty-one more into Gaza.

Gaza’s health ministry says more than 71,400 people have been fatally injured in the subsequent retaliatory offensive.