Heavy Rain Floods Gaza Tents as Residents Appeal for Shelter

I return to the residents’ accounts. First, there’s literal flooding.

In some tents, the water level has risen to one or two meters.

One of the men I met confirmed to me that he had lost his entire food supply as well as his tent’s bedding. The same was true of all his neighbors in the tents nearby.

The residents we met also confirmed that they hadn’t slept for even a single minute during the long night hours, since yesterday.

The rain hasn’t let up. It’s now nine a.m. local time.

The rain is still continuing, so we’ve had around twelve full hours of non-stop rain amid the complete destruction and collapse of infrastructure and drainage systems, so more suffering is inevitable as a result of these rain showers during the first real low-pressure system, in terms of falling temperatures,

the intensity of the rainfall, and also the speed of the winds.

The appeals we heard from the residents are very simple.

They are asking for some sandbags to protect their tents, if available, and for new tents for those whose tents were swept away by the water.

They are asking for some basic necessities that are practically impossible to replace amid the widespread shortages affecting everything in the Gaza Strip.

They are asking for plastic tarps to protect their tents.

At this moment, rain is still falling heavily across the Gaza Strip.

The thunderstorm is still here. The forecast is that this rainfall will continue for the next few hours, bringing even more suffering.

This is happening as municipalities declare their complete inability to keep up with and carry out the roles assigned to them in protecting residents and draining the water, as well.