24 minutes ago
By Yolande Knell, BBC News, Jerusalem
Asmahan al-Masri and 15 relatives live at a camp in Khan Younis, just feet away from piles of rubbish. Across the Gaza Strip, a landscape newly transformed by war, is now plagued by mountains of stinking rubbish that pose severe dangers to health and the environment.
“We’ve never lived next to rubbish before,” says Asmahan al-Masri, a displaced woman originally from Beit Hanoun in the north. “I cry just like any other grandmother would over her grandchildren being sick and having scabies. This is like a slow death. There is no dignity.”
In eight months, more than 330,400 tonnes of solid waste have built up in the Palestinian territory, according to the UN and humanitarian agencies working on sanitation. Sixteen members of the Masri family share a tent in a camp near al-Aqsa University, surrounded by clouds of flies and sometimes snakes. Stray dogs roam menacingly nearby, and all the residents complain of the constant stench.
“The smell is very disturbing. I keep my tent door open so that I can get some air, but there is no air,” Asmahan says. “Just the smell of rubbish.”
Desperation across Gaza is forcing many, like Mohamed, to scavenge for something to eat, use, or sell. Some of the more than one million people who recently fled Israel’s military offensive in the southern city of Rafah are now forced to live in open areas that have turned into temporary refuse tips.
“We searched everywhere for a suitable place, but we are 18 people with our children and grandchildren, and we couldn’t find anywhere else where we could stay together,” says Ali Nasser, who recently moved to the al-Aqsa University campsite from his home in Rafah.
“The journey here cost us over 1,000 shekels ($268; £212) and now our finances are destroyed. We have no jobs, no income, and so we are forced to live in this dire situation. We suffer from vomiting, diarrhea, and constantly itchy skin.”
Before the war, years of blockade imposed by Israel and Egypt on Gaza, which was governed by Hamas, had put a severe strain on basic services, such as waste disposal. The tight restrictions for what Israel said were security reasons on what could enter the territory meant there were insufficient rubbish trucks, a lack of equipment for sorting and recycling household waste and for disposing of it correctly.
Since the deadly 7 October Hamas-led attacks, Israel’s military has blocked access to the border area, where Gaza’s two main landfill sites are located. One in Juhr al-Dik previously served the north, and another, in al-Fukhari, served the central and southern areas.
“We’re seeing a waste management crisis in Gaza, and one that has gotten a lot worse over the past few months,” says Sam Rose, director of planning for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, Unrwa.
Social media footage compiled by BBC Verify shows temporary waste dumps have grown as people have fled in waves to different towns and cities. Satellite analysis by BBC Verify has shown that half of Gaza’s water and sewage treatment sites have been damaged or destroyed since Israel began its military action against Hamas.
“People are literally living amongst the garbage,” Mr. Rose says.
The mass displacement of people has overwhelmed local authorities often dealing with damaged facilities because of the ongoing Israeli bombardment. They complain of a lack of staff, equipment, and rubbish trucks as well as fuel to run them.
At the Khan Younis municipality, an official, Omar Matar, expresses regret over the appalling conditions for those now living near al-Aqsa University.
“These random dumps do not meet health and environmental standards. They do not stop the spread of odors, insects, and rodents,” he says.
“They were previously created as an emergency measure because of the closure of the Sofa landfill site [at al-Fukhari], until a solution is found with international institutions to transport the waste there,” he explains.
A spokesman for the Israeli military body, Cogat, told me it was looking at several different solutions for the Gaza waste problem.
The UN Development Programme says it has recently been involved in collecting 47,000 tonnes of waste from central and southern Gaza and has distributed 80,000 liters of fuel for the clean-up effort. But far more needs to be done.
Now as summer temperatures soar, there are new warnings from aid agencies about the health hazards posed by so much rubbish. Yet, desperation drives many Gazans to take extra risks: scavenging for something to eat, use, or sell.
“We got used to the smell. Every day we come here together to look for cardboard boxes and other things that we can burn to make fires,” says Mohammed, one of a group of boys picking over a rubbish dump near Deir al-Balah as it is filled with waste from aid packaging and rudimentary efforts to clear sites hit by Israeli air strikes.
Mazad Abu Mila, a displaced man from Beit Lahia, says he is looking for scrap metal that he could use to build a furnace.
“We left all our money behind, our shops, our cars, our livestock, our houses. All were left.” Esta es la cosa más peligrosa para nuestra salud. Nunca habría ido a un vertedero antes, pero ahora mismo, todo el mundo viene aquí. Información adicional de Paul Brown y Richard Irvine Brown de BBC Verify.