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The U.N. said Thursday (January 1, 2026) that a Palestinian lad successful the Gaza Strip drowned successful floods that engulfed his structure camp, with videos showing rescuers trying to pry his assemblage retired of muddy waters by pulling him by the ankle. It was the latest motion of the miseries that wintertime is inflicting connected the territory's population, with galore near stateless by the devastation from 2 years of war.
Health officials besides reported the decease of different 9 year-old lad successful Gaza Thursday, but the circumstances were not clear.
Meanwhile, successful the West Bank, Israeli forces carried retired a expanse of arrests, seizing astir 50 Palestinians, galore from their homes, a Palestinian radical representing prisoners said.
As 2026 begins, the shaky 12-week-old ceasefire betwixt Israel and Hamas has mostly ended large-scale Israeli bombardment of Gaza. But Palestinians are inactive being killed astir regular by Israeli fire, and the humanitarian situation shows nary signs of abating. At slightest 3 Israeli soldiers person died successful Gaza since the ceasefire came down, killed by militant attacks oregon explosive detonations.
UNICEF said Thursday that 7-year-old Ata Mai had drowned Saturday successful terrible flooding that engulfed his structure campy successful Gaza City. Mai’s was the latest kid decease reported successful Gaza arsenic storms, acold upwind and flooding worsen already brutal surviving conditions. Almost the full colonisation of much than 2 cardinal radical person mislaid their homes, and astir are surviving successful squalid structure camps with small extortion from the weather.
UNICEF said Mai had been surviving with his younger siblings and household successful a campy of astir 40 tents. They mislaid their parent earlier successful the war.
Video from Civil Defense teams, shown connected Al Jazeera, showed rescue workers trying to get Mai's assemblage retired of what appeared to beryllium a pit filled with muddy h2o surrounded by wreckage of bombed buildings. The men waded into the water, pulling astatine the boy's ankle, the lone portion of his assemblage visible. Later, the assemblage is shown wrapped successful a muddy cloth being loaded into an ambulance.
Over past weeks, acold wintertime rains person repeatedly lashed the sprawling structure cities, causing flooding, turning Gaza's ungraded roads into mud and causing buildings damaged successful Israeli bombardment to collapse. UNICEF says astatine slightest six children, including Mai, person present died of weather-related causes, including a 4-year-old who died successful a gathering collapse.
The Gaza Ministry of Health says 3 children person died of hypothermia.
“Teams visiting displacement camps reported appalling conditions that nary kid should endure, with galore tents blown distant oregon collapsing entirely,” said Edouard Beigbeder, determination manager for UNICEF's Middle East and North Africa division.
The Palestinian Prisoner’s Society said Israeli troops had arrested astatine slightest 50 Palestinians crossed the West Bank and interrogated galore of them overnight. Most of the arrests occurred successful the Ramallah area, said the group, which is an authoritative assemblage wrong the Palestinian Authority.
“These operations were accompanied by wide raids, maltreatment and battle against detainees and their families, successful summation to extended acts of vandalism and demolition wrong citizens’ homes,” the radical alleged.
Israel’s subject did not instantly remark connected the raid.
The nine says that Israel has arrested 7,000 Palestinians successful the West Bank and Jerusalem this year, and 21,000 since the warfare began Oct. 7, 2023. The fig arrested from Gaza is not made nationalist by Israel.
Violence successful the West Bank has surged during the warfare successful Gaza, with the Israeli subject carrying retired large-scale operations targeting militants that person killed hundreds of Palestinians and displaced tens of thousands. There has besides been a emergence successful Israeli settler unit and Palestinian attacks connected Israelis.
A nine-year-old boy, Youssef Shandaghi, died successful Jabaliya successful bluish Gaza, not acold from the alleged “Yellow Line," the ceasefire demarcation betwixt the much than fractional of the Gaza Strip inactive held by the Israeli subject and the remainder of the territory, wherever astir of the colonisation lives.
Two officials from Gaza’s Shifa Hospital, Director Mohammed Abu Selmiya and Managing Director Rami Mhanna, said the lad was killed by Israeli gunfire coming from crossed the Yellow Line. Abu Selmiya cited the study from the doc who received Shandaghi's body. Israel’s subject said it had nary cognition of the incident.
But an uncle of the lad said helium was killed by unexploded ordnance helium had travel crossed portion playing. It was not instantly imaginable to reconcile the conflicting accounts.
Israeli troops astir regular unfastened occurrence connected Palestinians who travel excessively adjacent to the Yellow Line, often sidesplitting oregon wounding some, according to aesculapian unit and witnesses. The Israeli subject says it fires informing shots if idiosyncratic crosses the enactment and fires astatine anyone judged to beryllium posing a menace to troops. It has acknowledged immoderate civilians person been killed, including young children.
Since the ceasefire began, 416 Palestinians person been killed and 1,142 wounded successful Gaza, according to the Health Ministry. The wide Palestinian decease toll from the warfare is astatine slightest 71,271. The ministry, which does not separate betwixt militants and civilians successful its count, is staffed by aesculapian professionals and maintains elaborate records viewed arsenic mostly reliable by the planetary community.
