As millions celebrated the new year, Palestinians were forced to remain awake for an entirely different reason, as rainfall flooded their tents and forced UNICEF medical facilities to shut down on New Year’s Eve in Gaza, Al Jazeera reported.
Footage from one of Central Gaza’s displacement camps highlights the inhumane conditions displaced people grapple with, as many tents flooded and the ground has turned into mud, ruining the few possessions they had left.
Some Palestinians placed buckets of water on the ground to protect carpets from leaks, while others dug trenches to drain water away from their tents.
“We’re drowning. Enough pain, enough suffering. I barely made it out of the fire alive with my daughters,” a distressed middle-aged woman told Al Jazeera as she stood in ankle-deep water inside her tent.
The woman narrowly escaped an Israeli airstrike early on Tuesday, which killed at least 28 Palestinians.
The attacks targeted northern Gaza’s Jabalia camp, the central Bureij refugee camp, Gaza City, and southern Khan Younis, Al Jazeera reported.
Palestinians in Gaza are suffering from a multi-layered crisis, as many parents mourn the death of their babies from hypothermia, and children mourn the death of their parents killed by Israel’s indiscriminate bombing of displaced people.