🔗 Share this article

Strong cold-season gusts caused walls to collapse upon fragile shelters sheltering people uprooted by war in Gaza, claiming the lives of at least four individuals. This tragedy underscores the dangerous situation that continue after more than two years of intense bombardment and critical shortages of aid.

Truce Offers Little Relief from Harsh Weather

Although a ceasefire has been active from October, humanitarian organizations report that residents broadly lack the sufficient housing required to withstand frequent cold-weather events.

Officials at Gaza City's largest medical facility, which received the victims, said on this week that the dead were a pair of adult females, a girl, and a male adult.

Separately, the Gaza health ministry announced on the same day that a 12-month-old infant died of extreme cold during the night.

"International actors has enabled us to experience loss of life in all its forms," said a family member following the funeral. "While it is correct the bombing may have paused for now, but we have seen every conceivable cause of death in the world in the Gaza Strip."

Family Buried in Shelter Collapse

As per Shifa hospital, 3 people of a single family — elderly a man, his teenage relative, and his daughter-in-law — were fatally injured when an 26-foot tall wall collapsed on top of their tent in a area near the sea of Gaza City. No fewer than 5 others were injured in the incident.

Their relatives on that day started clearing the rubble that had buried their loved ones and reconstructing the tent shelters for survivors.

Humanitarian Efforts and Ongoing Emergency

The UN and its aid organization allies were handing out tents, tarps, warm covers and clothes as well as nutrition and hygiene supplies across Gaza, stated the UN office for the coordination of humanitarian affairs.

The majority of the population live in makeshift tents because their homes were turned into ruins over the course of the war. Humanitarian organizations say not enough shelter materials are reaching Gaza under the truce.

Casualty Numbers After the Ceasefire

The Gaza health ministry, which is part of the administration, says over 440 people have been fatally shot by Israeli fire and their remains taken to hospitals after the ceasefire went into effect. The authority keeps detailed fatality data that are considered generally reliable by UN agencies and outside analysts.

A spokesperson for UNICEF, representing the UN children’s agency Unicef, said on Tuesday that no fewer than one hundred minors under the age of 18 – sixty males and 40 girls – had been killed after the truce started due to military operations, including unmanned aerial vehicle attacks, air raids, artillery fire and use of bullets. These numbers, he said, reflected cases where enough details had been gathered to justify recording, but the overall count is expected to be greater. He noted that many hundreds of minors had been wounded.

"Although 'bombings and shootings have decreased' during the ceasefire, they have not ceased," Elder told reporters at a press conference in Geneva by video link from Gaza City. "Therefore what the international community now calls calm would be considered a catastrophe in any other place," he concluded.

Third Winter of Hardship

Gaza’s residents of over two million individuals has been fighting to fend off the freezing temperatures and storms away while enduring shortages of humanitarian aid and a lack of sturdier temporary housing, which is badly needed during the colder season. This marks the 3rd winter since the conflict involving the state and the group began on a date in late 2023, when fighters attacked Israeli territory and murdered approximately 1,200 people and abducted 251 others into Gaza.

The local health authority says more than 71,400 people have been killed in the subsequent military campaign.