Three children were burnt to death in a fire in the besieged Gaza Strip on Tuesday. It is believed that the fire was started by candles being used to provide light in the family home during one of the territory’s frequent and lengthy power cuts.
Mahmoud, Mohammed, and Yousef Al-Hazeen, the eldest of which was no more than ten years old, were brothers living in the Al-Nuseirat refugee camp. They went to bed early on Tuesday because they weren’t allowed to play outside due to the coronavirus lockdown.
3 Palestinian children die in a nighttime fire in #Gaza — the cause? a candle; the reason? no electricity; why? israel's inhuman siege #BDS https://t.co/2yUHS4R0KI
— Sarah Wilkinson (@swilkinsonbc) September 2, 2020
According to the Ministry of Health in Gaza, the boys were declared to be dead on arrival at Al-Aqsa Hospital. The General Director of the hospital, Kamal Khattab, said that neighbors were unable to rescue the children due to the intensity of the fire.
Palestinian factions expressed their condolences for the tragedy and pointed out that the children were the victims of the brutal occupation and siege imposed by Israel on the Gaza Strip. Local ministry officials said that Israel must take its share of the blame for the children’s deaths.
Israel has closed the Karam Abu Salem crossing with Gaza due to the alleged breach of the security truce. Therefore, Gaza’s sole electricity plant is still not working, due to the lack of fuel.
***UPDATED*** #Israeli Warplanes Bomb #Gaza Targets (LIVE BLOG) https://t.co/Bc8vcTSk1y via @PalestineChron pic.twitter.com/phMrSeLOjz
— @palestinechron (@PalestineChron) August 20, 2020
At the moment, in some areas of Gaza electricity is only available for four hours a day, meaning that many residents have to resort to candles to light their homes.
Gaza, with a population of 2 million, has been under a hermetic Israeli siege since 2006, when the Palestinian group Hamas won the democratic legislative elections in occupied Palestine. Since then, Israel has carried out numerous bombing campaigns and several major wars, that resulted in the death of thousands of people.
(Palestine Chronicle, MEMO, Social Media)
