In brief
In Gaza, rains that started on Friday evening caused widespread flooding, collapsed shelters, and an infant’s death. Humanitarian stockpiles of tents, tarpaulins, blankets, and clothes are nearly exhausted, and the UN calls for urgent funding and removal of Israeli restrictions to deliver needed aid.
Heavy rains began over Gaza’s coast on Friday evening, flooding streets and shattering makeshift shelters, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported on Monday.
The deluge forced thousands of families to abandon homes, damaging essential services and the limited number of displacement sites that had been set up in the region.
Among the victims was an infant who drowned in rising water, and the collapse of a sandy hill that brought down tents, killing three children and two women, OCHA said; these incidents added to the mounting toll of civilians in the area.
OCHA’s chief humanitarian officer for Gaza, Ramiz Alakbarov, noted in Ramallah that while rain is a natural event, the vulnerability of the population is largely a result of sustained hostilities that have ruined homes and crucial infrastructure.
"People are living in worn‑out tents that cannot withstand what would be considered a moderate storm elsewhere," Alakbarov said.
Humanitarian partners, working under restrictive conditions, mobilised immediately to assess needs, hand out emergency supplies, and reinforce displaced‑person sites with sandbags, but they said the stock of tents, tarpaulins, blankets and clothes inside Gaza are now virtually exhausted.
The UN highlighted that more than 150,000 tents purchased by humanitarian partners and UN member states were outside Gaza, ready to be dispatched, yet transport of these items is hampered by a lack of equipment and strict administrative barriers.
The organization pointed out that rescuers need vacuum trucks, mobile dewatering pumps, engine oil, hoses and heavy machinery to restore access to flood‑affected areas, but humanitarian funding and Israeli approvals are urgently required for such resources to be brought in.
Terrain, infrastructure and security conditions have also allowed airstrikes to continue hitting populated areas, increasing casualties and compounding the humanitarian crisis, the UN said in its statement.
OCHA called on donors to accelerate funding and urged the Israeli authorities to lift “any unnecessary restrictions and delays, including those preventing humanitarian organisations from bringing enough supplies into Gaza,” a statement that underscored the urgency of overcoming bureaucratic obstacles.