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Powerful winter winds caused walls to collapse onto fragile shelters housing Palestinians uprooted by conflict in Gaza, claiming the lives of at least 4 people. This tragedy highlights the perilous living conditions that continue after over two years of intense airstrikes and severe shortages of aid.

Ceasefire Offers Little Relief from Harsh Weather

Although a ceasefire has been active from last fall, humanitarian organizations state that Palestinians broadly lack the adequate shelter required to survive recurring winter storms.

Officials at Shifa hospital, which took in the victims, reported on Tuesday that the dead were a pair of adult females, a girl, and a man.

Separately, the local health authority announced on Tuesday that a 12-month-old infant died of hypothermia overnight.

"International actors has allowed us to witness death in all its forms," stated Bassel Hamouda following the burial. "It’s true the shelling may have paused for now, but we have witnessed all imaginable reasons of death in the world in the Gaza Strip."

Relatives Crushed in Shelter Collapse

According to the medical center, 3 members of a single household — 72-year-old Mohamed Hamouda, his teenage relative, and his son's wife — were killed when an 26-foot high wall collapsed on top of their dwelling in a coastal area of the city. At least 5 others were hurt in the incident.

Family members on that day started clearing the rubble that had buried their family and reconstructing the tent shelters for those who remained.

Aid Efforts and Ongoing Crisis

United Nations agencies and its aid organization allies were distributing shelter kits, tarps, warm covers and clothes as well as food and hygiene items throughout Gaza, stated the relevant UN coordination body.

Most of the population live in makeshift shelters because their houses were reduced to ruins during the war. Humanitarian organizations contend not enough building supplies are reaching Gaza during the truce.

Fatality Numbers Since the Ceasefire

The Gaza health ministry, which is part of the Hamas-run government, reports over four hundred and forty individuals have been fatally shot by gunfire and their bodies taken to hospitals after the ceasefire began. The authority maintains detailed fatality data that are considered largely accurate by international bodies and outside analysts.

A spokesperson for UNICEF, representing the UN children's fund, stated on Tuesday that at least one hundred minors below eighteen years old – 60 boys and forty females – had been killed since the truce started because of military operations, including unmanned aerial vehicle attacks, air raids, artillery fire and use of bullets. These numbers, he explained, reflected incidents where enough details had been compiled to warrant recording, but the total toll is expected to be higher. He noted that many hundreds of minors had been injured.

"Although 'explosions and gunfire have slowed' during the truce, they have not ceased," the spokesperson informed journalists at a UN briefing in the Swiss city by video link from Gaza City. "So what the world now calls quiet would be viewed as a catastrophe anywhere else," he concluded.

Third Cold Season of Hardship

Gaza’s population of over two million people has been fighting to keep the freezing temperatures and storms at bay while enduring lack of humanitarian aid and a absence of sturdier transitional shelter, which is badly needed during the colder season. It’s the third winter since the conflict involving Israel and the group began on 7 October 2023, when militants stormed into southern Israel and murdered around 1,200 people and abducted two hundred and fifty-one others into Gaza.

Gaza’s health ministry reports more than 71,400 people have been fatally injured in the subsequent military campaign.