DaysofPal- The UN’s Palestinian refugee agency spokesperson, Louise Wateridge, told the UK newspaper Financial Times that once winter rains begin, an estimated half a million people in Gaza may be inundated with sewage.
“When it rains, sewage is going to pile up in lower [elevation] areas,” she told the newspaper. All displaced people “are using some kind of makeshift toilet and essentially trying to just get the sewage away from their shelter. But that doesn’t mean it’s not accumulating near somebody else’s or on the street.”
Palestinians in the Gaza Strip are forced to improvise after Israeli attacks destroyed much of the region’s infrastructure.
Wateridge stated that malnourished people “will get sicker because it all works against their health and wellbeing” during the winter.
She added that restrictions on aid deliveries have left 33 trucks full of mattresses parked at the Rafah crossing between Egypt and Gaza for six months, demonstrating how Israel continues to make it difficult to get aid into the Strip.
“At the current rate of aid entering, it will take two years to get it to everybody, so that they can all have basic things like mattresses, blankets, and waterproof tents and tarps,” she said.
Winter’s arrival has cast a bleak picture of Gaza; strong winds and rainstorms have already swept through the coastal strip, soaking those without much shelter and scattering tents in a crisis where Israel’s offensive has forced about 1.8 million Palestinians to flee their homes.
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