A 20-day-old infant froze to death in Gaza on Sunday amid Israel's continuous blockade of humanitarian aid including food, medicines and winter essentials. Jomaa al-Batran was the fifth infant to die of hypothermia in Gaza's tents where hundreds of Palestinians, displaced multiple times due to Israel's 15-month-long genocidal war have sought shelter amid rains and extreme cold.
According to his father Yehia, Jomaa al-Batranwas was found with his head as "cold as ice" when his parents woke up on Sunday. The baby's twin brother, Ali, was moved to the intensive care unit of Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital.
Their father said the twins were born one month premature and spent just a day in the nursery at the hospital, which like other health centers in Gaza has been overwhelmed and is only partially functioning.
He said medics told their mother to keep the newborns warm, but it was impossible because they live in a tent and temperatures regularly drop below 10 degrees Celsius (50 degrees Fahrenheit) at night.
"We are eight people, and we only have four blankets," al-Batran said as he cradled his son's pale body. He described drops of dew seeping through the tent cover overnight. "Look at his color because (of) the cold. Do you see how frozen he is?"
Children, some of them barefoot, stood outdoors and watched him mourn. The shrouded infant was laid at the feet of an imam, barely larger than his shoes. After prayers, the imam took off his ankle-length coat and wrapped it around the father.
"Feel warm, my brother," he said.
At least four other babies have died from the cold in recent weeks, according to local health officials.
Three of the five Palestinian babies who froze to death in less than a week lived in the “humanitarian zone” in al-Mawasi.
According to Israel's weather service, temperatures in Gaza in recent days were as low as eight degrees Celsius (46 Fahrenheit) at night.
Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians, displaced multiple times amid relentless attacks by the Israeli army, crammed into often ramshackle tents as the cold, wet winter sets in. Aid groups have struggled to deliver food and supplies and say there are shortages of blankets, warm clothing and firewood.
According to multiple reports, Israel has been deliberately preventing food, water, medicine and other essentials from entering into Gaza. It has also repeatedly attacked aid convoys and civilians gathered to collect whatever aid that manages to pass through the borders.
The U.N. has declared a famine in parts of Gaza. An independent panel of aid experts found that nearly half of the Palestinians in the enclave are struggling with hunger. Many go days without eating. Palestinian authorities say dozens of children have starved to death.
Investigations by two foremost US government agencies in September this year concluded that Israel has been interfering with aid works in Gaza by deliberately blocking essential supplies, killing aid workers, razing agricultural structures, bombing ambulances and hospitals, sitting on supply depots and routinely turning away trucks full of food and medicine.
Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza has so far killed over 45,300 Palestinians, more than half of them women and children. The offensive has caused widespread destruction and displaced some 90% of Gaza’s 2.3 million people, often multiple times.