At least six people were killed after heavy rain flooded tents and collapsed homes sheltering displaced families in Gaza. Footage shows the storm’s aftermath, including crumpled tents lying in muddy water and a collapsed wall.
Published On 13 Jan 202613 Jan 2026
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Severe weather conditions are bringing further misery to displaced Palestinians in Gaza, who have already suffered relentless bombardment, siege and loss in Israel’s genocidal war for more than two years, as Israel continues to block critical shelter and aid supplies into the territory.
Flimsy tents were flooded and makeshift camps engulfed in mud on Monday following heavy winter rains lashing the enclave in recent days.
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The harsh conditions have added to the suffering of Palestinians in Gaza, most of whom are reduced to sheltering in tents and other makeshift structures since Israel’s war destroyed an estimated 80 percent of the buildings there.
Officials are warning that severe conditions also bring new dangers, with the threat of disease and illness as overwhelmed and damaged sewage systems contaminate floodwaters, and the risk that damaged buildings could collapse amid heavy rainfall.
On Sunday, a 30-year-old woman was killed when a partially destroyed wall collapsed onto her tent in the Remal neighbourhood to the west of Gaza City amid fierce winds, Al Jazeera Arabic reported.
Officials have warned people not to shelter in damaged buildings, but the tents offer limited protection from the heavy rain and no real protection against flooding.
At least 15 people, including three babies, have died this month from hypothermia following the rains and plunging temperatures, according to the authorities in Gaza.
Two-month-old baby Arkan Firas Musleh was the latest infant to die as a result of the extreme cold.
Reporting from Gaza City’s Zeitoun neighbourhood, where most of the buildings have been reduced to rubble by Israeli attacks, Al Jazeera’s Hind Khoudary said the heavy rains had created deep puddles and thick mud that was difficult to pass in places.
“People are struggling to walk in those mud puddles,” she said. “These are not only water, but it’s also sewage, rubbish.”
A team of municipal workers were trying to pump sewage from the overwhelmed network, amid reports of flooded tents from residents.
“Families are saying that sewage water has been coming into their tents,” she said.
Aid groups have called for the international community to pressure Israel to lift restrictions on life-saving aid deliveries into the territory, which they say are falling far short of the amount called for under the US-brokered ceasefire.
“More rain. More human misery, despair and death,” Philippe Lazzarini, commissioner-general of UNRWA, the top United Nations group overseeing aid in Gaza, wrote on social media on Sunday.
“Harsh winter weather is compounding more than two years of suffering. People in Gaza are surviving in flimsy, waterlogged tents and among ruins.”
There was “nothing inevitable about this”, he added. “Aid supplies are not being allowed in at the scale required.”
Meanwhile, despite the ceasefire that came into effect on October 10, Israeli attacks on Palestinians have continued in Gaza.
Three Palestinians were injured on Monday when Israeli forces targeted the Jabalia camp in northern Gaza, a medical source told Al Jazeera Arabic.
Witnesses said the attack happened in an area from which Israeli forces had withdrawn under the ceasefire agreement.
Witnesses also reported an Israeli air raid on the eastern areas of the Bureij camp in central Gaza, artillery shelling east of Rafah and further Israeli attacks east of Gaza City, Al Jazeera Arabic reported.
A 20-point plan proposed by United States President Donald Trump in September called for an initial truce followed by steps towards a wider peace. So far, as part of the first phase, there has been the exchange of captives held in Gaza and prisoners in Israeli jails, and a partial withdrawal of Israeli forces from the enclave. However, it still occupies almost half of the territory.
However, Israeli attacks have not stopped, while humanitarian aid flows into the territory have not been what was promised.
Since the truce went into effect, more than 414 Palestinians have been killed and more than 1,100 wounded in ceasefire violations, according to Gaza’s Ministry of Health.
Tens of thousands of displaced Palestinians in Gaza, surrounded by tents and debris, are suffering through more winter rains after two years of Israeli bombardment destroyed much of the Strip.
A polar low-pressure system accompanied by heavy rain and strong winds swept across the Gaza Strip on Saturday. It is the third polar low to affect the Palestinian territory this winter, with a fourth low-pressure system forecast to hit the area starting on Monday, meteorologist Laith al-Allami told the Anadolu news agency.
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Many families have been living in tents since late 2023, for most of the duration of Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza.
The enclave is imminently facing freezing temperatures, rain and strong winds, as the authorities warn the downpour could intensify into a full-blown storm.
Mohammed Maslah, a displaced Palestinian now in Gaza City, told Al Jazeera in his rugged tent that he did not have a choice but to stay there.
“I could not find anywhere to live in Gaza, except Gaza Port,” he told Al Jazeera. “I’m forced to stay here because my home is under Israeli control. After just a few hours of rain, we were soaked.”
In Deir al-Balah, Shaima Wadi, a mother of four children who was displaced from Jabaliya in the north, spoke to the Associated Press. “We have been living in this tent for two years. Every time it rains and the tent collapses over our heads, we try to put up new pieces of wood,” she said. “With how expensive everything has become, and without any income, we can barely afford clothes for our children or mattresses for them to sleep on.”
The heavy rains earlier this month flooded tents and makeshift shelters across Gaza, where most of the buildings have been destroyed or damaged by Israeli attacks.
So far in December, at least 15 people, including three babies, died from hypothermia following rains and plunging temperatures, with several buildings collapsing, according to the authorities in Gaza. Aid organisations have called for Israel to allow more shelters and other humanitarian aid into the territory.
Ibrahim Abu al-Reesh, head of field operations for the Civil Defence in the Gaza Port area, said that his teams responded to various distress calls as weather conditions got harsher in places where displaced people set up fragile tents.
“We worked hard to cover some of these damaged tents with plastic sheets after they were flooded by rainwater,” he told Al Jazeera.
Al Jazeera’s Ibrahim Al Khalili, reporting from Gaza City, said that winter has been adding to the suffering of tens of thousands of displaced Palestinians who do not have safe shelters.
“The same misery repeats as each rain fills neighbourhoods with muddy water,” he said.
As Palestinians face dire conditions in Gaza, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is expected to visit Washington, DC, in the coming days while negotiators and others discuss the second stage of the ceasefire that took effect on October 10.
The progress in the peace process has been slow. Challenges in phase two of the ceasefire include the deployment of an international stabilisation force, a technocratic governing body for Gaza, the proposed disarmament of Hamas and further Israeli troop withdrawals from the territory.
So far, the agreement has partially held despite Israel’s repeated violations.
Since the ceasefire went into effect, more than 414 Palestinians have been killed and 1,142 wounded, according to Gaza’s Ministry of Health.
It also said the bodies of 679 people were pulled from the rubble during the same period, as the truce makes it safer to search for the remains of people killed earlier.
The ministry on Saturday said that 29 bodies, including 25 recovered from under the rubble, had been brought to local hospitals over the past 48 hours.
The overall Palestinian death toll from Israel’s war has risen to at least 71,266, the ministry said, and another 171,219 have been wounded.