Nearly 2m in Gaza lack winter shelter, warns IOM

GAZA CITY, Oct 10: Nearly all of Gaza’s population of some two million people urgently require shelter assistance as winter approaches, with barely 17 percent of identified winter needs covered so far, the United Nations’ International Organization for Migration (IOM) has warned.

After years of displacement and widespread destruction, Palestinians are facing another winter without adequate protection from rain, cold and severe flooding. The IOM said severe funding shortages and restrictions imposed by Israeli authorities on the entry of critical aid are worsening the crisis.

“Families who have already endured repeated displacement and devastating loss must be able to face the winter in safety and dignity,” IOM Director General Amy Pope said. “Shelter materials must enter quickly, predictably and at the scale required.”

The agency, alongside its humanitarian partners, has identified nearly 1.8 million displaced people residing in high-risk flood zones. It said floodwaters could damage remaining shelters, destroy families’ remaining possessions and force people into further displacement.

AFP adds, one year after US President Donald Trump declared the war in Gaza to be over, few of the long-term promises of the ceasefire have come to fruition.

Three days after the agreement was announced, Hamas freed the 20 remaining living hostages seized during the group's October 7, 2023 attack, the deadliest day in Israel's history.

The captives' return was a key priority for Israel, whose public had agonised over their fate.

The ceasefire anniversary also marks one year of quiet for Israel from the Gaza front, with no rocket attacks by Hamas.

The group's missile inventory was depleted by near-constant Israeli bombardment, which damaged or destroyed the vast majority of buildings in the Palestinian territory.

The US military set up a command post with foreign allies near the Gaza border to monitor the truce.

Israel has reduced its level of attacks but has kept striking Gaza on a near-daily basis.

Israeli strikes have killed some 1,450 Palestinians since the ceasefire, according to Gaza's health ministry, which operates under Hamas and whose figures are considered accurate by the United Nations.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is in a tight election race, has vowed to kill everyone involved in the October 7 attack.

Netanyahu said on the attack's anniversary that 4,000 out of 6,000 "Hamas monsters" had been 
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