DaysofPal – The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) has warned that 1.6 million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip are currently suffering from dangerous or multiple levels of malnutrition and food insecurity, as Israeli restrictions continue to block the entry of critical humanitarian supplies needed for winter.
Adnan Abu Hasna, UNRWA’s media adviser, said the alarming situation comes as a severe winter low-pressure system batters Gaza, tearing apart thousands of deteriorating tents, while Israel continues to hold back some 6,000 aid trucks loaded with hundreds of thousands of tents, blankets, and food supplies at Gaza’s crossings.
Abu Hasna stressed that the ongoing storm is having catastrophic and immediate consequences for displaced families. He explained that strong winds have uprooted thousands of makeshift shelters, while rainwater and sewage have flooded large residential areas.
Most of the so-called tents, he noted, were erected haphazardly using plastic sheets and scraps of fabric and cannot be considered proper shelters capable of protecting their occupants.
Even tents that were originally suitable have become worn out and ineffective after repeated displacement over dozens of times, he added, leaving them unable to withstand the powerful storms and heavy rainfall currently sweeping the enclave.
According to Abu Hasna, many people in Gaza feel that the war has not ended but is continuing in different forms. He explained that the steady deterioration of humanitarian conditions, the growing number of patients, and the ongoing ban on the entry of hundreds of food and non-food items, including spare parts for water and sewage stations, medical equipment, and essential medicines, represent alternative forms of warfare against the civilian population.
He further revealed that Israel is preventing UNRWA from delivering 6,000 aid trucks carrying hundreds of thousands of tents purchased by the agency at a cost of hundreds of millions of dollars.
These supplies are urgently needed, he said, and include vast quantities of blankets and winter clothing, as well as food stocks sufficient to feed Gaza’s population for three months—all of which remain stranded at the borders.
The human toll of the storm has already proven deadly. Since the onset of the current low-pressure system, three people have died, the most recent being an infant who succumbed to extreme cold.
Despite severe limitations, UNRWA continues to carry out emergency interventions. Abu Hasna said the agency is currently sheltering around 80,000 Palestinians in its facilities, while hundreds of thousands more have gathered around these centers seeking safety and assistance.
He noted that UNRWA’s 12,000 staff members inside Gaza are working around the clock, with environmental health and logistics teams responding continuously. However, he described the unfolding situation as a “massive humanitarian earthquake or tsunami” that far exceeds the capacity of UNRWA or Gaza’s largely destroyed municipalities.
The lack of heavy machinery, water pumps, and mobile sewage treatment units is severely hampering relief efforts, Abu Hasna warned. Many of these essential tools are barred from entering Gaza, leaving humanitarian responses by UNRWA and other organizations extremely limited due to acute shortages of resources.
Abu Hasna cautioned of a dramatic and dangerous deterioration in humanitarian conditions, emphasizing that UNRWA is striving to prevent a return to “ground zero,” when Gaza faced famine and a near-total collapse of humanitarian and medical services.
He warned that continued rainfall and future low-pressure systems would further worsen the crisis, noting that the heaviest rains typically fall in January and February.
Recalling a previous incident in which a half-meter rise in sea level swept away hundreds of tents, Abu Hasna said Gaza is on the brink of severe deterioration unless essential equipment and hundreds of thousands of tents currently waiting at the borders are allowed to enter immediately.
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