Sand embankment collapses onto Gaza tent camp, killing five

Five people were killed on Sunday night when a sand embankment collapsed onto tents at a camp for displaced families south of Deir al-Balah in central Gaza, according to the territory's Hamas-run Civil Defence service. The dead were three children and two women, and five injured people were pulled from the debris. Video from the scene showed men searching for survivors beneath boulders, sand and crumpled tents using mobile phone torches.

The collapse came a day after torrential rain flooded tens of thousands of tents across Gaza, leaving many Palestinians without a dry place to sleep. The Civil Defence said water reached up to 1.5m (4.9ft) in some spots, and that its crews could respond to only 10% of the 2,100 distress calls they received. It called the deaths a humanitarian tragedy and urged international organisations to move tents away from sandy ground, slopes and other collapse-prone sites, warning that shelters must not become death traps beneath sand and rainwater.

Karl Baker, regional crisis co-ordinator for the International Organization for Migration, told the BBC from Gaza that the territory's 2.1 million residents are squeezed into just 30% of its area, with many living in places especially prone to flooding. He said the UN agency and its partners are working to supply enough tents and tarpaulins and to improve drainage in camps ahead of winter, but described the aid currently entering Gaza as the very smallest of Band-Aids. We need more support, in-kind donations. We need funding in order to help the communities to help themselves, he said.

UN agencies have pressed Israeli authorities to let in the specialist equipment and materials needed to improve conditions for displaced families. Cogat, the Israeli military body that co-ordinates deliveries, said on Sunday that more than 91,000 tents, 12 vacuum trucks for waste removal, and fuel and engine oil for pumping stations had gone in since the start of the Gaza Winterization Plan. It added that Israel will not allow equipment that Hamas and other armed groups could use for military purposes.

The UN estimates 80% of structures in Gaza have been destroyed or damaged in the war, with more than 1.9 million people displaced, many of them repeatedly, and 1.2 million now in tents or makeshift shelters. It has warned the humanitarian situation remains dire despite the ceasefire agreed in October 2025, as Israeli air strikes and other attacks continue to hit populated areas. The war was triggered by the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, when about 1,200 people were killed and 251 taken hostage; more than 74,640 people have been killed in Gaza since, according to the Hamas-run health ministry, whose figures the UN considers reliable.