Bad newsGaza Rain Floods 70,000 Tents as Aid Groups and Israel Trade Blame
Heavy rain since Friday night flooded tents across Gaza and killed at least five people in a sandbank collapse, local authorities say. Aid agencies blame Israeli entry limits on shelter supplies. Israeli officials say tens of thousands of tents were delivered.
This story runs on the bad side only. The biggest stories of the day are told on both sides.
The first winter storm of the season has left tens of thousands of displaced people in Gaza sleeping in flooded shelters. Heavy rain and strong winds have hit the territory since late Friday, and the Hamas-run Gaza Government Media Office says 70,000 tents were flooded and dozens of walls brought down. At least five people, four of them children, were killed in central Gaza when a sandbank collapsed onto tents, according to Al Jazeera, citing local health authorities.
The Gaza Civil Defence says it has received more than 1,500 emergency calls and that over 2,000 buildings are at risk of collapse. It says at least 300,000 tents are needed to give displaced families adequate shelter. Al Jazeera’s reporter in Gaza City said nearly 400,000 displaced people are sheltering in places considered highly vulnerable to more flooding. Its correspondent in Deir el-Balah said families there had not received food aid since early Saturday.
The dispute over supplies
Aid groups say the damage was foreseeable. Save the Children’s regional director, Ahmad Alhendawi, said tents, shelter kits and fuel are waiting at Gaza’s borders because Israeli authorities are blocking their entry. He called it a choice that children are paying for. UNICEF’s special representative in Palestine, Jonathan Veitch, said most people are living in terrible conditions and called for more funding.
Israeli officials reject that account. The Jerusalem Post reports that Israeli security officials said supplies had already gone in ahead of winter. They named the Israeli Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories, the Gaza Board of Peace and the UN as the deliverers. The list included 91,000 new tents, waterproof tarps and 9,000 truckloads of clothing and blankets. The officials said the situation is the best since the war began, though they acknowledged difficulties in Gaza.
The same officials said equipment to rebuild permanent buildings and mobile homes will not be allowed in while Hamas refuses to disarm. They accused Hamas of exploiting aid to rebuild its military wing. Hamas blamed Israel for the flooding. None of these claims has been independently checked in the sources we reviewed, and the two sides’ figures cannot yet be reconciled: 91,000 delivered tents against 300,000 said to be needed.
What the numbers say
A later count cited by the Jerusalem Post puts the Hamas-run Civil Defence tally at 2,166 distress calls, of which it says it could answer only 218. The media office estimated the storm’s damage at about $3 million. Al Jazeera’s report puts the war’s toll at more than 74,640 dead since 7 October 2023. It says at least 1,610 Palestinians have been killed since a ceasefire took effect in October 2025. Those totals are Al Jazeera’s account and are not independently confirmed here.
For the families affected the practical issue is simple. A tent that has flooded does not dry quickly in November, and mattresses, blankets and clothes are lost. More rain would fall on people who have already lost what they had.
What would change it
The sources point to two things. One is the volume and speed of shelter supplies crossing into Gaza, which aid groups and Israeli officials describe in opposite terms. The other is the entry of heavier reconstruction materials, which Israeli security officials say depends on Hamas disarming. Neither side has given a date for a change. Until one comes, the next storm will meet the same tents.
