DaysofPal – A young Palestinian woman was killed early Sunday when a wall from a home damaged by earlier Israeli airstrikes collapsed onto her tent in the Rimal neighborhood of western Gaza City, as powerful storms battered the besieged enclave and devastated thousands of shelters for displaced families.
Medical sources said the 30-year-old woman died instantly after the wall fell on her tent in the port area of Rimal. Witnesses explained that the house had been partially destroyed during Israel’s war on Gaza; fierce winds brought by the storm caused the weakened wall to collapse onto a nearby tent housing displaced people. Several members of the woman’s family were also injured.
The deadly incident came as heavy rainfall and strong winds, which began Saturday evening, swept across Gaza, flooding and blowing away thousands of makeshift tents used by displaced Palestinians.
In southern Gaza, hundreds of tents erected along the coast of Khan Younis were inundated by seawater as high waves surged inland under the influence of the storm.
This is the third major low-pressure system to hit Gaza since the start of the current winter. The previous two storms resulted in the deaths of 17 Palestinians, including four children, caused the collapse of homes already weakened by Israeli bombardment, and destroyed or flooded tens of thousands of tents.
On Sunday morning, the Palestinian Meteorological Department warned residents of the dangers associated with the ongoing weather conditions, including very strong winds, flash floods, and slippery roads.
Weather observer Laith Allami said that a fourth low-pressure system is expected to affect Palestine, including Gaza, starting Monday.
The current storm has further intensified the suffering of Palestinians living in fragile tents that provide little protection against rainwater and freezing temperatures.
According to earlier statements by Gaza’s Civil Defense, around 90 percent of shelters for displaced people, whose homes were destroyed by Israel, have been flooded since the beginning of December.
Government media figures indicate that more than a quarter of a million displaced people have been harmed by the winter storms, out of roughly 1.5 million Palestinians forced to live in tents or rudimentary shelters that fail to meet basic humanitarian standards.
The humanitarian crisis in Gaza persists despite the formal end of Israel’s war with the entry into force of a ceasefire agreement between Hamas and Israel on October 10.
Conditions on the ground have shown little improvement, largely due to Israel’s failure to meet its commitments under the agreement, including reopening border crossings and allowing the agreed quantities of food, medical supplies, relief aid, shelter materials, and mobile homes into the territory.
Israel launched its war on Gaza on October 8, 2023, a campaign that lasted two years and resulted in the deaths of more than 71,000 Palestinians and injuries to over 171,000 others. The offensive caused massive destruction to approximately 90 percent of Gaza’s civilian infrastructure, with the United Nations estimating reconstruction costs at around $70 billion.
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