OCHA: Heavy rains flood tents, heighten health risks in Gaza

11 December 2025

OCHA reports that heavy rains in the Gaza Strip have flooded tents, soaked people’s belongings and increased health risks – including hypothermia among babies and illnesses linked to overflowing sewage.

Today, humanitarian teams on the ground set up a system for a rapid, joint response to flooding alerts. It brings together UN agencies and non-governmental organizations (NGOs), working side-by-side to distribute tents, tarpaulins, warm clothes, blankets and dignity kits across Gaza. As of earlier today, they had already processed over 160 flooding alerts since the morning and undertaken assessments covering more than 16,000 families in different areas. These numbers are expected to increase as more updates come in from teams on the ground.

Philippe Lazzarini, the Commissioner-General of the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), said on social media that with this ongoing storm, people who had already lost everything – and need everything – now face another layer of misery. He said that UNRWA teams – many of whom are displaced themselves – are pumping away sewage and floodwater, clearing garbage, distributing critical items and providing medical care.

Ahead of this storm, the UN and its partners had already stepped up winter support, including for families in shoreline areas at high risk of flooding, and for others choosing to relocate away from those areas.*

Partners leading on site management helped people prepare by distributing empty flour sacks to be used as sandbags, along with tools and sand wherever possible. Based on their flood-risk analysis, more than 760 displacement sites – hosting roughly 850,000 people – are at the highest risk of flooding. This constitutes about 40 per cent of Gaza’s population.

Over the past week, the UN and its partners continued delivering relief items: more tents and tarpaulins, as well as a significant increase in winter clothing for children – from 5,000 to 8,000 kits every day. Partners leading on water and sanitation are supporting pre-positioned mobile pumps in low-lying areas and put contractors with heavy machinery on standby. They have also been working hard to clear and unblock stormwater and sewage systems.

OCHA stresses that to meet the immense needs, restrictions on humanitarian operations must be eased or lifted. This includes ending the ongoing ban on most international NGOs and on UNRWA – which continue to serve communities despite operating under severe constraints. Efforts to further scale up the response also depend on more crossings, more routes, and approval to bring a wider range of relief items into Gaza.