15 million tons of rubble covers Gaza today and consists of a toxic mixture of dust, ash and other materials. The size of the rubble scattered in the Strip is approximately 4 times the size of the Great Pyramid, which in the long run will lead to serious health effects on the residents of Gaza.
Dr. Muhammad Hassan Al-Tarawneh, a consultant in chest and respiratory diseases and a Jordanian respiratory infection expert, had said in previous statements to Tel Aviv Tribune Net that the Gaza Strip is witnessing the dropping of a huge amount of explosives in light of the Israeli aggression, and this war could leave a toxic environmental impact and cause untold damage to human health. .
The ongoing Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip led to the death of 25,295 Palestinians, according to what the Gaza Ministry of Health said in a statement on Monday, and another 63,000 were injured in the aggression.
The Israeli aggression has wreaked havoc on the water, land and even air in the Strip, threatening the long-term health of its residents.
A report on the Scientific American website said that the devastation exceeds anything the residents of Gaza have ever witnessed, and the ongoing air, sea and ground attack – according to United Nations estimates – has damaged or destroyed about a fifth of the buildings in Gaza.
Blow up
When these buildings – a total of about 40 thousand buildings – were blown up, the concrete, insulating materials, explosives from missiles and other materials – not to mention the residents’ property – turned into toxic dust.
Jabalia refugee camp, for example – a sprawling neighborhood that includes residential towers known to contain asbestos – has witnessed repeated attacks.
According to former disaster waste manager Thorsten Kalnishkis, who has advised cleanup operations in 20 countries, 15 million tons of debris now litter the Gaza Strip.
Studies conducted after the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States were among the first to link exposure to such a mixture of waste to lung and respiratory diseases and cancer.
Public health experts say the number of deaths from debris-related diseases caused by the devastation in New York will soon exceed the number of victims of the September 11 attacks, if it has not already done so.
Wim Zwenenberg, a researcher at the Dutch peace organization “PAX”, said that civilians in places where there is a lot of dust, debris and rubble inhale it frequently, but at the present time no one is looking at this type of risk, but it has effects on the ground.
Gaza is among the most densely populated places in the world, rivaling London’s population density, making toxic pollution linked to decades of conflict one of the “serious long-term public health and environmental problems” faced by Gazans, according to a report issued by PAX on December 18. First past.
“It is a known and unknown matter. We know it is a risk, but we do not know the extent of it in Gaza now,” Zwinenberg said.
Crushed concrete
Research after the events of September 11 demonstrated links between building demolitions and a range of short- and long-term illnesses. The attacks on the World Trade Center produced a toxic cloud of dust, smoke and fumes, the exact composition of which remains unknown. Most of the particles are believed to consist of concrete. Crushed.
The rest are about 150 items of glass, wood, lead, asbestos, heavy metals and PCBs, which are carcinogenic substances produced by burned wires and electronics.
Most building materials are harmless in their everyday state, but their explosion gives them the opportunity to enter the body. “Just like tobacco smoke, it is a toxic mixture,” said Anna Rule, an assistant professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
She added that the nose and throat may pick up larger particles, but smaller ones move inside the body “a bit like a gas,” passing through the lungs into the bloodstream and into other vital systems.
He Yin, an assistant professor of geography at Kent State University, believes that the fighting has damaged 15 to 29 percent of Gaza’s arable land.
The PAX report identifies a plume of black smoke from a soda plant, indicating burning plastics, and also speaks of extensive damage to an industrial complex where medicines, cosmetics, plastics and other chemical goods are made.
In November, The New York Times noted a massive fire at a water treatment plant, a frightening development in one of the most water-scarce places in the world.
The debris is also likely to pose a danger, and the volume of rubble scattered in the sector is approximately 4 times the size of the Great Pyramid of Giza, according to Kalnishkis.
Inhaling silica – a major component of cement and glass – also increases the risk of cancer, while the greatest exposure occurs when a building is destroyed, as its debris poses a danger.
Toxic waste
Dr. Tarawneh said that the toxic waste carried by war into the Gaza Strip includes:
Tarawneh stated that toxic remnants of war can lead to many harmful health effects on humans. In Vietnam, for example, research indicates a significant increase in the risk of birth defects among children of parents exposed to Agent Orange, and in some locations extremely high levels of dioxins were found in Soil, sediments and foods, as well as in human breast milk and blood.
Agent Orange is a substance that the Americans used in their war in Vietnam, and it continues to cause children to be born with birth defects, cancer, and disabilities.
American forces sprayed 80 million liters of Agent Orange over South Vietnam between 1962 and 1971, which is a herbicide and defoliant, in a desperate attempt to expel the communist militias from their hideouts and deprive them of food.
In Gaza, elevated amounts of heavy metals have been identified in mothers and newborns exposed to military attacks.
Also in Gaza, birth defects have been linked to exposure to white phosphorus and other bombs that contain toxic and cancer-causing metals.
Tarawneh said that we will see an increase in the rate of cancer among Gazans, because air pollution due to suspended particles resulting from explosives increases the possibility of lung cancer.
The British surgeon of Palestinian origin, Ghassan Abu Sitta, had said in previous statements that Israel aims to make Gaza an uninhabitable place for life by targeting hospitals in particular.
Abu Sitta explained that Israeli politicians and military leaders are acting very clearly in order to make Gaza an uninhabitable place.
He added that they want to cleanse Gaza of its residents, and one of the most effective ways to make the place uninhabitable is to destroy the health sector.