‘No picture can convey the injustice’: Gaza’s tents submerged as floods leave displaced people without shelter

Walking under heavy rainfall that swept through the Gaza Strip, Aboul Abd Moussa made his way home on Wednesday from Gaza City’s Mukhabarat area, bearing witness to the devastation brought on by extreme weather that has flooded displacement tents, leaving millions stranded and exposed to the elements.

Moussa described passing the Mukhabarat area’s hollowed out high rise towers where floodwater swept through the destroyed streets, turning them into one long, dark road. 

Wherever he looked, Moussa told Mada Masr, all he could see were “destroyed tents and displaced people left shivering without shelter.”

After the announcement of  a ceasefire — which Israeli forces have routinely violated since it came into effect, killing over 300 people — many of the 1.5 million-plus displaced people in Gaza have tried to repair the homes that were damaged by the Occupation’s two-years war. 

But with as much as 80 percent of the strip flattened, and Israeli forces still occupying around 50 percent of the enclave, nearly 795,000 displaced Palestinians still rely on makeshift camps along the coast for shelter.

But the camps were not made to withstand the stormy weather that has set in for the winter. 

Photographer Mahdy Zourob, who is sheltering in the coastal Mawasi area in southwestern Gaza, told Mada Masr that his tent was uprooted by the storm along with the tents of many other displaced Palestinians on Monday evening.

He tried in vain to salvage it, but barely managed to save his belongings and photography equipment. 

Zourob turned on his camera and began to photograph his reality: muddy ground, displaced neighbors exposed to the elements with their tents crumpled and dragged away by the wind, and the terrified faces of children consumed by despair in the harsh conditions.

After he took some pictures, the heavy rainfall claimed Zourob's camera too. 

He told Mada Masr that it felt like his broken camera was “more truthful and genuine” than the stills he had captured earlier in the day. 

“No words can describe what we lived and continue to live through, and no picture can convey the extent of the tragedy and injustice,” he said. “When my camera stopped working, one thing came to mind: no one could [truly] hear the voices or see the pictures of these people. So I went, just like them, to find refuge away from the rain.”

Moussa said that the floodwater damage is so extensive that even crossing the road has become a difficult task. “With every meter I crossed, I would fall once or twice into potholes,” he said. 

The damage to temporary shelters is also extensive. “When I passed by I saw a relief organization pitching nearly 200 tents,” Mousa recalled. “ I came back later and found them all destroyed by the rain and wind.”

“Each group was huddled together, not knowing what to do,” Moussa continued. “Each camp in the area was living through an indescribable tragedy, [people] were standing amid floodwater mixed with sewage water, watching all their food, clothes and belongings being submerged inside the tents. Everything they owned was gone in a second.”

Gaza authorities issued warnings earlier in the year that floodwater could contribute to a dangerous spread in disease. Municipality officials said that floodwater contaminated with sewage would spread to tented areas and expose displaced people to water-borne infections.

Waste disposal systems have been incapacitated by Israel’s war and there are no supplies or equipment to undertake maintenance and repairs. 

Mousa described how the conditions affected one family he met trying to cross the road on foot, wading through inches of water. 

The father was carrying his child as well as the family luggage, and the wife’s exhausted face showed the strain of their journey.

Moussa approached the family to help them, finding that their child had been born only hours earlier the same day. The exhausted mother was still holding a blood transfusion bag in her hand. 

“I held the newborn child so the man could help his wife, lit the road with a flashlight and walked with the family through the rain to a school in the area where the displaced were seeking refuge. There was no transportation, nothing at all,” Moussa said. “I can’t describe how difficult the road and the scene were, I really can’t.” 

Stormy weather hit the strip and has continued in recent days, affecting healthcare facilities as well as camps.

Shifa Medical Complex director Mohamed Abu Salima said on Monday the emergency and operations departments have been flooded by the heavy rains, disrupting operations within the facility.

ِAbu Salima’s statement came hours before the Gaza Health Ministry announced the death of a two-week-old infant due to the “severe cold.” 

As Israel continues to tightly control the supplies entering the strip, the United Nations, along with Palestinian officials, highlighted on Tuesday the dire need for at least 300,000 new tents for Gaza’s displaced population.

According to the UN report, since the ceasefire was announced in October, less than 50,000 tents were allowed into the strip and given to 270,000 individuals. 

Meanwhile, the report added that Israel had rejected the entry of thousands of pallets of shelter materials, while many humanitarian organizations were blocked from operating inside the strip.