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Strong winter winds caused walls to collapse upon flimsy shelters housing Palestinians uprooted by conflict in Gaza, killing at least four people. These deaths underscores the perilous situation that continue after more than two years of intense bombardment and critical lack of aid.

Truce Offers No Relief from Severe Weather

While a ceasefire has been active from last fall, aid groups state that residents do not have the sufficient shelter required to survive recurring winter storms.

Officials at Shifa hospital, which took in the victims, said on Tuesday that the deceased include a pair of adult females, a young female, and a male adult.

In a separate incident, the Gaza health ministry announced on the same day that a 12-month-old infant succumbed of extreme cold during the night.

"International actors has enabled us to experience loss of life in all its forms," stated a family member after the burial. "It’s true the shelling may have temporarily stopped, but we have witnessed all imaginable reasons of fatality in the world in the Gaza Strip."

Family Buried in Tent Collapse

According to the medical center, 3 people of a one family — elderly Mohamed Hamouda, his teenage relative, and his son's wife — were killed when an eight-metre tall wall fell onto their dwelling in a area near the sea of the city. No fewer than five additional people were injured in the incident.

Their relatives on that day began removing the debris that had entombed their loved ones and rebuilding the tent shelters for those who remained.

Humanitarian Distribution and Continuing Emergency

The UN and its aid organization allies were handing out tents, tarps, blankets and clothing as well as food and hygiene supplies throughout Gaza, stated the relevant UN coordination body.

The majority of Palestinians reside in improvised tents because their houses were reduced to ruins during the hostilities. Aid groups say an insufficient amount of building supplies are entering Gaza during the truce.

Fatality Numbers Since the Ceasefire

Local health authorities, part of the administration, reports more than four hundred and forty people have been fatally shot by Israeli fire and their bodies taken to hospitals after the ceasefire went into effect. The authority maintains detailed casualty data that are considered largely accurate by UN agencies and independent experts.

A spokesperson for UNICEF, spokesperson for the UN children's fund, stated on Tuesday that no fewer than one hundred minors below eighteen years old – sixty males and 40 girls – had been killed after the ceasefire started because of military operations, such as unmanned aerial vehicle attacks, air raids, artillery fire and use of bullets. Those figures, he explained, reflected cases where sufficient information had been compiled to warrant documentation, but the overall count is believed to be higher. He added that hundreds of minors had been wounded.

"Although 'explosions and shootings have decreased' during the truce, they have not stopped," Elder informed journalists at a press conference in Geneva by video from the Strip. "So what the international community now calls quiet would be considered a crisis in any other place," he concluded.

Third Cold Season of Hardship

Gaza’s population of over 2 million individuals has been fighting to fend off the cold weather and storms at bay while facing lack of humanitarian aid and a absence of sturdier temporary housing, which is urgently required throughout the winter months. This marks the 3rd winter since the conflict between the state and the group started on a date in late 2023, when fighters stormed into southern Israel and killed approximately twelve hundred individuals and took hostage two hundred and fifty-one others into Gaza.

Gaza’s health ministry says over 71,400 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s military campaign.