As Palestinians look for shelter, some pitch their tents next to landfill in Gaza City
CBC
Palestinians in Gaza say they have nowhere to go as Israel's renewed offensive forces thousands to leave their homes and once again face displacement in the war-ravaged territory.
Some Palestinians pitched their tents next to mounds of garbage at a landfill near the Yarmouk Stadium in Gaza City after being ordered by the Israeli army to evacuate the north and head toward the south.
Holding an empty water jug in hand, Widad Sobh said she ended up in Yarmouk Stadium along with her family after being forced to evacuate Beit Lahiya this week amid the renewed Israeli fighting and ground invasion.
"We can't find a place to go," the 47-year-old told CBC News on Friday. "This is the place I found and I stayed here, where should I go?"
"It's all garbage. We came to garbage, and the water isn't clean," said Sobh.
Sabah Marouf, 50, said she was also displaced from Beit Lahiya after fleeing the bombardment, and ended up at the former football stadium now overflowing with waste.
"We can't find anyone to help us or anyone to even look at us in the face," Marouf told CBC News freelance videographer Mohamed El Saife.
"We're next to the garbage and the smell is killing us, and the dirt is killing us."
"When it rains our mats and blankets are all water … we were drowning in water here," Maazouza Fathi Sobh said.
The 48-year-old grandmother said she and her grandchildren are sick from being so close to the landfill and not having proper shelter from the elements, which mix with the waste and flow into the tents.
"It seeps into our mats and on us and we wake up finding ourselves soaked in the [garbage] water," she said. Children in the area plugged their noses as the landfill odour wafted through the area.
A fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hamas collapsed earlier this week, as Israel's renewed offensive has killed more than 600 Palestinians in Gaza since Tuesday.
Shadi Al-Ashqar, a resident from the northern Gaza town of Beit Lahiya, fled on foot toward the south with his wife and children — once again not knowing where to find shelter.
"We were settled in our homes even with all of the destruction surrounding us but we accepted it and made do with what we could," Al-Ashqar told El Saife on Friday.
