GAZA CITY, Palestine

Six newborn babies froze to death in the Gaza Strip amid cold weather in the war-torn enclave, a Palestinian health official said on Tuesday.

“Six infants died from severe cold in Gaza,” Marwan al-Hams, Director General of Field Hospitals in Gaza, told the local Al-Aqsa TV.

He appealed for allowing access to power generators and oxygen stations to help hospitals provide services to Palestinians.

Saeed Salah, Director of the Patient’s Friends Benevolent Society Hospital in Gaza, told Anadolu early Tuesday that nine infants were hospitalized in the past two weeks due to health complications caused by severe cold.

“Of the nine cases, five babies aged between one day and two weeks died,” he said.

He said the nine babies were transferred to the hospital from northern Gaza, where most of the population has been displaced and living in tents following Israel’s destructive war on the enclave.

Salah appealed to the international community to intervene to allow the entry of mobile homes, tents, and fuel into Gaza to provide shelter to thousands of Palestinians.

The Palestinian resistance group Hamas blamed Israel’s “criminal policies” for the baby deaths in Gaza.

In a statement, the group called for immediate intervention “to stop Israel’s violations of the ceasefire agreement and allow the entry of urgent shelter, heating, and medical aid supplies into Gaza to the children there.”

According to Gaza’s government media office, nearly 1.5 million Palestinians have been left without home or shelter after the Israeli war.

A ceasefire and prisoner exchange agreement has been in place in Gaza since last month, pausing the Israeli war that has killed at least 48,350 people, mostly women and children, and left the enclave in ruins.

Last November, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its war on the enclave.