After 10 months of war, Palestinians in the Gaza Strip are living in constant desperation to find a safe place.
“We are tired of displacement. People are being pushed into narrow areas in Deir Al-Balah and Al-Mawasi, which have become pressure cookers,” Tamer Al-Burai, who lives in Deir Al-Balah with several relatives, told Reuters via a chat app. Tanks were just 1.5 km (0.9 miles) away, Burai added.
On Friday, the military ordered the evacuation of areas north of Khan Younis and east of Deir Al-Balah where hundreds of thousands of people displaced by earlier fighting had been sheltering in dire conditions.
The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said Friday’s orders, which included other parts of Gaza outside the humanitarian zones, had reduced the size of the “humanitarian area” designated as safe by Israeli forces to about 11 per cent of the total area of the territory.
The Deir Al-Balah municipality, estimating the current population in the city at 1 million, said the evacuation orders meant more people were crammed into a smaller space.
Additionally, water shortages loomed as several water wells and tankers that used to provide residents with 60 per cent of supplies were located in the areas under evacuation orders, the municipality said in a statement on Sunday.
