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The Gaza civil defence service said a sandy embankment gave way late on November 8 at a displacement camp south of Deir al-Balah in central Gaza, burying several tents and killing five Palestinians while injuring at least five others. Three of the dead were children and two were women, according to first responders who recovered the bodies from under sand, boulders and collapsed structures. Mahmoud Bassal, spokesperson for the service, stated that rescue teams continued searching for missing individuals at the site where heavy rain had saturated the ground.
Rescuers and camp residents used shovels, basic tools and their hands to clear debris as video footage showed men searching by torchlight from mobile phones, multiple news outlets including Al Jazeera reported. Bassal added that five injured people were pulled alive from the rubble and taken to medical facilities for treatment. The civil defence service warned displaced families to avoid areas near sand masses or elevated soil mounds during periods of rainfall because of the threat of further collapses.
The Gaza Government Media Office called the incident a humanitarian tragedy that highlighted the urgent need for international organisations to provide safe shelters and move tents away from risky locations, according to statements carried on November 9. The office said the collapse should compel action to address conditions facing displaced Palestinians. Bassal reiterated that humanitarian partners must supply necessary equipment to mitigate such dangers in the future.
Heavy rainfall from the first significant winter storm flooded around 70,000 tents across Gaza within a single day, the government media office said, leaving many families without dry shelter. The civil defence service received more than 2,100 distress calls but responded to only 10 percent of them because of widespread flooding that reached depths of 1.5 metres in places. A United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs situation report issued on November 9 noted appeals for help from over 26,000 households whose shelters were damaged, with more than 6,000 family shelters destroyed and another 17,400 affected.
Save the Children said in a statement that more than half a million children were living in critical or catastrophic shelter conditions ahead of the storm, with Israeli restrictions continuing to block entry of materials such as caravans that could provide better protection. The organisation added that many families resorted to burning garbage or plastic to stay warm, increasing health risks from toxic fumes. A Palestine Shelter Cluster assessment cited by the group found that 1.2 million people, including over 560,000 children, faced inadequate housing after years of displacement.
Munir al-Bursh, director general of the Gaza health ministry, warned that approximately 350,000 displaced Palestinians were left exposed to the elements without proper protection from rain, cold or structural failures. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs report added that humanitarian stocks of tents, tarpaulins and blankets inside Gaza were virtually exhausted, with over 150,000 tents ready outside the territory but requiring approvals for entry. Gaza’s health ministry figures show more than 74,640 people have been killed in the territory since October 2023, according to data the United Nations considers reliable.
