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Strong cold-season gusts caused walls to collapse onto fragile shelters housing Palestinians uprooted by conflict in Gaza, killing at least 4 individuals. These deaths underscores the perilous situation that persist after more than two years of devastating bombardment and severe shortages of humanitarian assistance.

Truce Provides Little Relief from Severe Weather

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

Medical staff at Shifa hospital, which received the bodies, reported on Tuesday that the deceased were two women, a young female, and a man.

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

"International actors has enabled us to witness death in every possible way," said a family member following the burial. "It’s true the shelling may have paused for now, but we have witnessed all imaginable reasons of fatality in the world in the Gaza Strip."

Relatives Crushed in Shelter Collapse

According to Shifa hospital, 3 members of a one family — 72-year-old a man, his teenage granddaughter, and his son's wife — were fatally injured when an eight-metre high wall collapsed onto their tent in a area near the sea of Gaza City. At least 5 others were hurt in the event.

Family members on Tuesday started clearing the rubble that had buried their loved ones and rebuilding the temporary homes for those who remained.

Humanitarian Efforts and Continuing Emergency

United Nations agencies and its humanitarian partners were handing out shelter kits, plastic sheeting, warm covers and clothing as well as food and hygiene items throughout Gaza, said the relevant UN coordination body.

The majority of Palestinians reside in improvised tents since their homes were turned into ruins over the course of the war. Aid groups say an insufficient amount of building supplies are reaching Gaza during the truce.

Casualty Numbers After the Truce

The Gaza health ministry, which is part of the administration, reports more than 440 individuals have been killed by gunfire and their bodies brought to hospitals after the truce began. The ministry keeps detailed fatality records that are considered generally reliable by UN agencies and outside analysts.

James Elder, spokesperson for the UN children’s agency Unicef, said on Tuesday that at least 100 children under the age of 18 – sixty boys and 40 girls – had been lost their lives after the truce started due to military operations, such as drone strikes, air raids, artillery fire and use of live ammunition. Those figures, he said, reflected cases where enough information had been compiled to warrant recording, but the overall count is expected to be higher. He added that many hundreds of minors had been injured.

"While 'bombings and gunfire have decreased' during the truce, they have not stopped," Elder informed reporters at a UN briefing in Geneva by video from the Strip. "Therefore what the international community now terms calm would be viewed as a catastrophe in any other place," he said.

Third Cold Season of Hardship

Gaza’s residents of over 2 million people has been fighting to keep the cold weather and bad weather away while facing shortages of humanitarian aid and a absence of more substantial temporary housing, which is urgently required throughout the colder season. It’s the 3rd winter since the conflict involving the state and the group began on a date in late 2023, when fighters attacked Israeli territory and murdered approximately twelve hundred people and abducted two hundred and fifty-one others into Gaza.

Gaza’s health ministry reports more than seventy-one thousand four hundred people have been killed in Israel’s military campaign.