Gaza Herald – Under the scorching and unforgiving summer sun, hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians in Al-Mawasi of Khan Younis, are facing an existential catastrophe. After nearly three years of relentless genocide, the makeshift tents that once offered a fragile semblance of shelter have completely rotted, melted, and disintegrated. With temperatures converting these plastic encampments into lethal, suffocating ovens, families are left completely exposed to the elements. Local authorities warn that the crisis is the direct result of Israel’s calculated policy of “shelter deprivation,” used as a weapon of ethnic cleansing through a strict blockade on basic humanitarian supplies.
“A Dead Piece of Fabric”
Inside a shredded tent that barely conceals its occupants, 67-year-old Fatima Al-Abadla tries in vain to shield her grandchildren from the piercing sunbeams. The scalding air traps the heat inside, turning her family’s living space into a furnace.
“This is not a tent; this is a dead piece of fabric,” Al-Abadla said, wiping sweat from her pale, exhausted face. “It shields no sun and repels no heat. The plastic sheet that used to cover us literally melted over our heads from the extreme summer heat.”
A short distance away, Raed Abu Tair stands inside what remains of his decimated shelter, now a hollow, dilapidated wooden skeleton.
“We are living in true exposure under the open sky. This is not a shelter; it is a slow execution chamber,” he described.
Forced to Improvise in a Ripped-Apart Sanctuary
In Al-Sumoud camp in Al-Mawasi, 54-year-old Iyad Al-Astal stares at the gaping tears in his roof, which he painstakingly patched together using empty flour sacks and decaying burlap.
“The fabrics have completely eroded due to months of sun, rain, and wind. Today, the sun beams directly at us as if we are sleeping on the streets without a roof,” Al-Astal explained.
He noted that navigating local markets for plastic covers or tarpaulins is futile. Due to the total blockade, the very few materials available are sold at astronomical prices far beyond his reach. “We are literally living inside an open furnace that is eating away at my children’s health.”
Compounding this thermal torture is a catastrophic water scarcity. Displaced Palestinians do not have access to enough clean water for drinking, sanitation, or even to douse their burning tents to lower the interior temperatures.
Shelter Deprivation: A Calculated Weapon of Genocide
Local officials state that no new tents have entered the Gaza Strip for over three months, following highly restricted and insufficient winter shipments.
Ismail Al-Thawabta, Director General of the Government Media Office in Gaza, stated that Israel is systematically exploiting “shelter deprivation” as a pillar of its genocidal warfare.
The Israeli occupation has enforced a total ban on the entry of tents and shelter materials for over 650 consecutive days. This goes hand-in-hand with the prolonged closure of vital border crossings, which has blocked more than 390,000 trucks filled with critical humanitarian and relief aid from entering the Gaza Strip.
Looming Health Catastrophe
The Media Office issued a dire warning regarding the accelerating environmental and epidemiological fallout. The overcrowding of families inside these rotting, unventilated fabrics has triggered an unprecedented health crisis, causing over 2.142 million cases of various infectious diseases and 71,000 cases of viral hepatitis.
As the peak of the summer heat approaches, medical teams fear these staggering numbers will rapidly surge, threatening a massive wave of heatstroke and fatal dehydration among the most vulnerable, particularly children and the elderly.
