They gathered Friday morning to participate in a funeral procession, multiple local media reported. Video footage showed a crowd of people walking through the streets with the corpses.
According to official information, 21 people died in a fire in an apartment in a multi-storey building on Thursday evening. At least seven children are among the dead, the director of the local hospital, Salah Abu Laila, told the German news agency on Thursday evening.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas declared Friday a day of mourning – flags flown at half-mast. The ruling Islamist Palestinian organization in the Gaza Strip, Hamas, called on the population to attend the funeral of the dead.
According to the Gaza Ministry of Internal Security, the fire broke out on the top floor of an apartment in the Jabalia refugee camp and spread to the rest of the house. According to civil protection, all people who were inside were killed. Large amounts of fuel are said to be stored in the building. The investigation into the cause of the fire continued.
Most recently, in March 2020, a devastating fire broke out at a bakery in Nuseirat refugee camp in the Gaza Strip. At that time, 15 people were killed when a gas cylinder exploded. In total, about 2.2 million inhabitants of the Gaza Strip live in very poor conditions.
(SDA)