[News] Gaza babies dying from the cold as winter temperatures drop

[Dexter.]

 

Sila was less than three weeks old when her mother Nariman realised she wasn't moving.

"I woke up in the morning and told my husband that the baby hadn't stirred for a while. He uncovered her face and found her blue, biting her tongue, with blood coming out of her mouth," says Nariman al-Najmeh.

In their tent situated on the beach in southern Gaza, Nariman is sitting with her husband, Mahmoud Fasih, and their two young children - Rayan, who is four years old, and Nihad, who is two and a half.

The family say they have been displaced more than 10 times during the 14-month war.

"My husband is a fisherman, we're from the north and left without anything but we did it for our children," says Nariman in an interview with a freelance cameraman working with the BBC. Israel prevents international media from entering and freely working on the ground in Gaza.

"When I was pregnant, I used to think about how I was going to get clothes for the baby. I was really worried because my husband doesn't have work."

During her 20 days of life, Sila's home was the small and overcrowded campsite in the al-Mawasi "humanitarian area", where hundreds of thousands of Palestinians displaced from elsewhere in the territory have been ordered to move by the Israeli military.

The area suffers from poor infrastructure and sanitation, as well as flooding caused by both rain and waves from the Mediterranean Sea.

"The cold is bitter and harsh. All night, because of the cold, we huddle together, curling up next to each other," says Sila's father, Mahmoud.

"Our life is hell. It's hell because of the effects of the war, my family was martyred, and our situation is unbearable."

Despite telling civilians to head to the area, the Israeli military has struck al-Mawasi repeatedly during its campaign against Hamas and other armed groups in Gaza.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cd0ep0j83p7o