A staggering 260,000 tons of waste now blanket Gaza, threatening over one million displaced people with disease and disaster. Gaza Municipality has issued an urgent warning about a looming environmental catastrophe as waste, sewage, and infrastructure failures converge under siege conditions.

Husni Mehanna, spokesperson for the Emergency Committee, described a rapidly worsening health crisis. With soaring temperatures and no way to treat or remove the waste, toxic runoff is seeping into the ground, risking irreversible contamination of Gaza’s already fragile water supply. “We are on the edge of a disaster,” he said.

The threat extends beyond rubbish. The Sheikh Radwan sewage basin, located near densely populated displacement camps, has reached 70% capacity. If it overflows, it could flood entire tent cities with contaminated water, unleashing deadly outbreaks of intestinal and infectious diseases.

Israel’s destruction of sewage systems, water lines, and waste management machinery has paralysed basic services. Fuel shortages mean wells, sanitation facilities, and sewage pumps have come to a near standstill. Gaza’s few remaining desalination plants can barely function, pushing the Strip dangerously close to total water deprivation.

With over a million people squeezed into western Gaza and repeated Israeli calls for further displacement, public health is collapsing. The streets are filled with rubble, rodents, and insects. The municipality, stripped of 134 vehicles and heavy machinery by Israeli airstrikes, is powerless to intervene.

Mehanna called on the international community to act immediately to prevent the outbreak of mass disease and irreversible damage to Gaza’s environment. “This is not just a humanitarian crisis,” he warned. “It’s a slow-motion environmental collapse.”