By Tareq Alhelou, Mohammad Al Sawalhi, Zeena Saifi, Abeer Salman, Ibrahim Dahman, CNN
A Palestinian man clears stagnant water from the road near a displacement camp after the first winter rainfall in Gaza City on Friday. Photo: Omar Al-Qattaa / AFP / Getty Images via CNN Newsource
Displaced Palestinians in Gaza woke up Friday morning (local time) to inches of water flooding their tents, after heavy rainfall overnight left their shelters and belongings soaked with no way to dry them out.
Officials in Gaza have received "hundreds of pleas for help," Mahmoud Basal, the spokesperson for Gaza Civil Defense, told journalists, "but the resources are nonexistent."
"Entire shelter centers have seen water levels rise to more than 10 centimeters (3.94 inches). Mattresses are soaked, blankets are drenched and there are no options left - because every option has been destroyed by Israel," he said.
A Palestinian man clears stagnant water from the road near a displacement camp after the first winter rainfall in Gaza City on Friday. Photo: Omar Al-Qattaa / AFP / Getty Images via CNN Newsource
Displaced Palestinians in Gaza City told CNN that the tents people were staying in were worn out, with some collapsing under the weight of the rain.
"We have been flooded by the rain, us and our little children," Raed Al-Alayan said. "Our tents were flooded. There is no roof to protect us from the rain."
Storms are common for Gaza this time of year, but with hundreds of thousands of Palestinians displaced from permanent shelter even a normal amount of rainfall can inundate residents and exacerbate already dire conditions.
Palestinians, whose homes were destroyed during Israel's two-year attacks, have hard times after their makeshift tents were flooded with the intense rain in Gaza City, Gaza on Friday. Photo: Abdalhkem Abu Riash / Anadolu / Getty Images via CNN Newsource
The rain persisted in the morning, when men and women frantically attempted to mop away the rainwater that kept pouring back into their tents.
"We have been awake since 2:30 am because of the rain. Everything is soaked; the mattresses and the blankets," Abdulbasset Abulhadi told CNN.
One woman guided CNN around and into her family's soaked tents where she said she had 20 kids sheltering, including newborns. She began to wail and cry out in distress when describing the state she finds herself in.
"Where should we go?" she asked several times. "My son who was killed built these tents for us. What am I supposed to do now?"
A displaced Palestinian woman pushes water away from her tent after heavy rainfall at a makeshift camp inside Gaza's port during a rainstorm in Gaza, Palestine, on Friday. Photo: Fathi / NurPhoto / Shutterstock via CNN Newsource
Medical Aid for Palestinians (MAP)'s Communications Officer in Gaza Mai Elawawda described Friday as "one of the hardest days in Gaza since the ceasefire."
"Early this morning, heavy rain flooded the tents of displaced families, along with the few belongings they still have. Most of these families are surviving in completely worn-out tents that have travelled with them through two years of nonstop Israeli attacks and forced displacement. Frayed under the sun, these tents are now collapsing with the first signs of winter," Elawawda said in a statement.
According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), more than 1.4 million people in Gaza are in need of emergency shelter items and more than 320,000 housing units have been damaged by Israeli military attacks.
Despite the urgent needs, only a fraction of shelter aid has been allowed to enter Gaza by the Israeli authorities. One displaced resident said he hasn't received a tarp throughout the entire war.
"Most of our bedding was soaked. We drowned in just five minutes of rain," Abu Mohammad Abaeeb told CNN.
CNN has reached out to Israeli authorities for comment on the amount of aid allowed into Gaza and the accusations by aid organisations that it continues to block humanitarian aid.
- CNN
