Deir el-Balah, Gaza Strip – Gaza is dealing with the cleanup of catastrophic flooding after storms submerged displacement camps and war-destroyed cities.
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storms → deal → camps
Heavy rain has directly affected 106,000 people in Gaza, according to UNICEF, with thousands of tents for displaced Palestinians submerged under water and latrines overflowing into camps.
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latrines → affect → camps
- list 2 of 3Father, child among eight Palestinians killed in Israeli attacks on Gaza
- list 3 of 3Gaza’s infrastructure collapse leaves residents defenceless against floods
The floods also brought death:
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floods → kill → death
a sandbank under pressure from heavy rain collapsed at the Ard al-Ribat displacement camp in Deir el-Balah, central Gaza, on Sunday evening, killing three children and a woman.
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sandbank → collapse → children
Without excavation equipment, residents had to dig through the sand with their bare hands to reach people trapped under debris.
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residents → have → debris
When darkness came, they used flashlights on their mobile phones to search for survivors.
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they → come → survivors
Zahira al-Sahar, 58, was preparing to sleep in her tent in the camp on Sunday when she and her 28-year-old daughter were almost entombed in the collapse.
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she → prepare → collapse
“I was lying in my bedding when something suddenly pushed me and came down on top of me,” al-Sahar told Al Jazeera.
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Sahar → lie → Jazeera
“The sand reached up to my neck.
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sand → reach → neck
My daughter was beside me, and she was almost completely buried.”
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she → bury → me
Her sons came to the rescue.
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sons → come → rescue
“I told them: ‘Pull your sister out first, then come back for me.’
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I → tell → me
They pulled her out, then came back and rescued me,” she said.
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she → pull → me
Meanwhile, in a neighbouring tent, members of the al-Nabhan family were also buried in the sandbank’s collapse.
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members → bury → collapse
“[When I realised] I started screaming and calling for people to come and help,” al-Sahar said.
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Sahar → realise → ?
“I told everyone that our neighbours had been buried.
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neighbours → tell → everyone
We kept shouting: ‘Please, save them.
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We → shout → them
Our neighbours are gone.’
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neighbours → go → ?
But the family did not respond to the rescuers’ calls.
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family → respond → calls
Their father, Ahmed, who was only recently released from Israeli detention, is the family’s sole survivor.
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who → release → detention
“[Ahmed al-Nabhan] and his wife had been very happy after he came out of prison.
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he → come → prison
They were looking forward to having another child in a few months,” said Suhaib Abu Darabi, 32, who was among neighbours who rushed to the site to help save them.
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who → look → them
Abu Darabi said the collapse sounded like an explosion and was followed by screaming.
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collapse → say → screaming
The site was exposed to the elements and on unstable ground and collapsed after just a few minutes of rain.
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site → expose → rain
By the time neighbours reached the area, they found two tents completely buried under debris.
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they → reach → debris
Abu Darabi said residents were digging with whatever tools they could find.
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they → say → tools
“We managed to clear some of the rubble, but we could not save the people trapped underneath.
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we → manage → people
The scale of the collapse was far beyond what the residents here could handle, given the lack of resources,” Abu Darabi told Al Jazeera.
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Darabi → handle → Jazeera
“The tents that collapsed beneath the embankment are what the world saw.
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world → collapse → what
But what people did not see was that all these tents fell to the ground that night.
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tents → see → ground
Residents had to repair whatever they could so they could continue living in them.
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they → have → them
In the neighbouring al-Zein family’s tent, four-year-old Habiba was killed, while her mother, Reem, and brother Ibrahim remain in intensive care.
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mother → kill → care
The scale of the damage caused by this winter’s first storm, which began on November 6, was significant and has exposed the dangers faced by families living in tents with little protection from extreme weather.
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which → cause → weather
This is the fourth winter since Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza began, in October 2023, and hundreds of thousands of people are living in tattered tents or makeshift shelters that have been exposed to the elements for years.
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that → begin → years
More than 26,000 households had reported damage to their shelters or other belongings by November 8, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported.
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Office → report → Affairs
The UN estimated that about 1.4 million people, or 65 percent of Gaza’s population, were living in tents or makeshift shelters when the storms hit.
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storms → estimate → tents
The danger is only compounded by the extensive destruction of Gaza’s infrastructure from Israeli strikes.
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danger → compound → strikes
Drainage networks have been severely damaged, roads and access routes remain in poor condition, and municipalities lack sufficient equipment to remove accumulated rainwater and respond to emergencies.
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municipalities → damage → emergencies
Gaza’s Government Media Office described the Deir el-Balah sandbank collapse as a humanitarian disaster.
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Office → describe → disaster
It said it held Israel, the United States administration and the international community responsible and the blocking of proper shelters, construction materials, mobile homes, fuel and spare parts was a factor in the deadly floods.
The media office also said the failure of the so-called Board of Peace and the National Committee for the Administration of Gaza to act in the crisis also raised “serious questions about the purpose of these bodies”, which have been accused of working with Israel to continue its siege on Gaza.
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which → say → Gaza
…and 16 more, not listed.
The Aporia
