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Strong winter gusts brought walls down onto flimsy shelters housing people uprooted by war in Gaza, killing no fewer than four people. These deaths underscores the dangerous living conditions that continue after over two years of intense airstrikes and severe lack of humanitarian assistance.

Ceasefire Provides No Relief from Harsh Elements

Although a ceasefire has been in effect since last fall, aid groups state that Palestinians broadly lack the sufficient housing necessary to withstand recurring winter storms.

Officials at Gaza City's largest medical facility, which received the victims, said on this week that the dead were two women, a young female, and a male adult.

Separately, the Gaza health ministry announced on Tuesday that a one-year-old boy died of hypothermia during the night.

"The world has enabled us to witness death in every possible way," stated Bassel Hamouda after the funeral. "It’s true the bombing may have temporarily stopped, but we have witnessed every conceivable cause of death in the world in the Gaza Strip."

Family Buried in Tent Collapse

According to the medical center, 3 members of a single family — elderly a man, his teenage relative, and his daughter-in-law — were killed when an 26-foot tall wall collapsed onto their tent in a area near the sea of the city. At least 5 others were injured in the incident.

Their relatives on Tuesday started removing the rubble that had buried their family and reconstructing the tent shelters for those who remained.

Aid Efforts and Ongoing Crisis

The UN and its humanitarian partners were distributing tents, plastic sheeting, warm covers and clothing as well as food and sanitation supplies throughout Gaza, said the relevant UN coordination body.

The majority of Palestinians live in makeshift shelters since their homes were turned into ruins during the war. Humanitarian organizations say not enough shelter materials are reaching Gaza under the ceasefire.

Casualty Figures After the Ceasefire

The Gaza health ministry, which is part of the administration, reports more than four hundred and forty individuals have been killed by gunfire and their bodies taken to hospitals after the truce went into effect. The ministry keeps comprehensive fatality records that are seen as generally reliable by international bodies and outside analysts.

A spokesperson for UNICEF, spokesperson for the UN children's fund, said on that day that no fewer than 100 children below eighteen years old – sixty boys and 40 girls – had been lost their lives since the ceasefire began due to armed actions, such as drone strikes, airstrikes, artillery fire and employment of live ammunition. Those figures, he explained, represented cases where sufficient details had been gathered to justify recording, but the overall count is believed to be higher. He added that hundreds of children had been wounded.

"Although 'bombings and gunfire have decreased' during the ceasefire, they have not ceased," the spokesperson informed reporters at a UN briefing in Geneva by video link from Gaza City. "Therefore what the world now terms quiet would be viewed as a crisis anywhere else," he concluded.

Third Winter of Hardship

Gaza’s residents of more than two million people has been struggling to fend off the freezing temperatures and bad weather away while enduring shortages of humanitarian aid and a lack of sturdier transitional shelter, which is urgently needed during the colder season. This marks the third cold season since the conflict between the state and Hamas began on a date in late 2023, when fighters attacked Israeli territory and murdered approximately 1,200 people and abducted two hundred and fifty-one more into Gaza.

The local health authority reports over 71,400 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s retaliatory offensive.