TEHRAN — Kinan Ahmad Raqiq died in a tent in Khan Younis on November 12. He was nine months old.
Gaza’s Health Ministry called it the first cold-related death of the winter. The hospital that received his body, Nasser, had been hit by an Israeli airstrike the same day. Six people were killed, among them the surgeon Rizq Abu Shaeira.
“I woke up only to see his skin had turned blue, so I rushed him to Nasser Hospital, but he had already died from hypothermia and frozen to death,” his father, Ahmed Raqiq, told AFP.
The baby died after a storm that Gaza’s Government Media Office says flooded about 70,000 tents in 12 hours. Oxfam estimates the water displaced around 100,000 people.
By November 8, the UN humanitarian office, OCHA, had received appeals from more than 26,000 households whose shelters or belongings were damaged.
About 1.4 million Palestinians, 65 percent of Gaza’s population, now live in tents or makeshift shelters, OCHA says. More than 150,000 tents are waiting outside the Strip.
Inside, aid agencies have virtually nothing left to distribute. In early November, they calculated that Gaza needed 121,000 tents and 57,000 emergency shelter kits. None of the kits were in stock.
In October, the UN migration agency, IOM, said the supply pipeline covered only 17 percent of winter shelter…
