The Gaza water crisis is intensifying by the day. In the pre-dawn darkness along the Gaza City seafront, before the scorching summer heat climbs to thirty-three degrees Celsius, Ibtisam Al Helou leaves her tent. The Mediterranean Sea lies just steps away, an endless blue horizon stretching into the distance. Yet the water her family needs to cook, drink, and wash requires a treacherous journey across shattered neighbourhoods.  This is the daily reality of the Gaza water crisis.

The forty-year-old mother, who cares for nine children in her household, treks to areas like Al Mina and Abu Mazen simply hoping a water point is active. In her camp, water arrives once every three days if they are fortunate. Before the conflict, her children washed three times a day in the summer heat. Today, they are lucky to bathe once a week. When desperate children plunge into the sea to cool down, they return with severe skin allergies, itching, and scabies caused by untreated sewage filling the coastal waters. 

Her struggle is not an isolated one. It reflects the daily reality for more than two million Palestinians trapped in an unprecedented collapse of water and sanitation infrastructure. As summer takes hold, access to safe drinking water has become a matter of immediate survival. 

Through One Ummah’s Drops of Mercy campaign, we are working tirelessly on the ground to deliver emergency relief. While our teams construct permanent boreholes and wells in places like Kenya, Uganda, and Sierra Leone, Gaza requires a different lifesaving response. With local water networks decimated and groundwater contaminated, One Ummah delivers safe drinking water directly to displaced families in Gaza using mobile water trucks. 

A Catastrophic Collapse of Basic Infrastructure -A Water Crisis Families Cannot Escape

The scale of the crisis in Gaza is staggering. According to Palestinian health and sanitation officials, fewer than one hundred of Gaza’s three hundred and twenty pre-war water wells remain operational. Furthermore, over eighty percent of the water distribution network and most of the desalination plants have been damaged or completely destroyed. 

The International Committee of the Red Cross reports that seawater and untreated sewage have contaminated the majority of remaining groundwater sources. More than three hundred thousand cesspits are discharging untreated wastewater into Gaza’s coastal aquifer, destroying the enclave's only natural freshwater source. 

International organisations paint a grim picture of daily survival: 

• Severe Rationing - United Nations assessments reveal that over 1.3 million people, more than half of Gaza's population, survive on less than six litres of water per day for all their needs. 
• Extreme Scarcity - Medical charity Médecins Sans Frontières reports that many residents receive an average of just 4.3 litres per person daily. This stands in stark contrast to the pre-conflict average of eighty-five litres per person each day. 
• Life on the Frontline - The International Committee of the Red Cross notes that roughly eighty percent of Gaza's population now relies entirely on mobile water trucks to stay alive. 

For displaced mothers like Hanadi Al Aff, who lives opposite a damaged desalination plant in Gaza City, every morning brings heartbreaking choices. She describes how her five children must lug heavy buckets through dusty streets instead of attending school. Families are forced to choose between using a cup of water to wash hands or keeping it for drinking and cooking. When hygiene is sacrificed out of necessity, disease spreads rapidly through overcrowded camps. 

Why Emergency Water Trucks are Gaza’s Lifeline 

In many developing regions affected by drought, drilling a borehole well is the ideal long-term solution. However, in Gaza, ongoing bombardment, destruction of electrical grids, and severe contamination of the underground water table make well construction unviable in the immediate crisis. 

This is why One Ummah’s Drops of Mercy campaign focuses on mobile water trucking across Gaza. 

Water trucks serve as mobile sanctuaries. They navigate through rubble and destroyed streets to deliver clean, purified drinking water directly into the containers of waiting families. Each truckload restores dignity, prevents fatal dehydration, and protects young children from toxic waterborne illnesses like typhoid and cholera. 

The Messenger of Allah said, 'The best charity is to give water' [Nasai, 3664]. 

When you support the Drops of Mercy campaign, your contribution fills these trucks and reaches mothers who have spent hours searching for a single drop under the blazing sun. 

The Reward of Preserving Human Life 

In Islam, easing the thirst of another human being carries unmatched spiritual weight. Allah has bound the Ummah together in mutual care and compassion. To leave our brothers and sisters in Gaza to drink salty, contaminated water while we enjoy unlimited clean water is something our hearts cannot accept. 

The Qur'an speaks directly to the value of human life: 'if anyone saves a life, it shall be as though he had saved the lives of all mankind' [Qur'an, 5:32]. 

Every time a child in Gaza drinks clean water from a One Ummah truck, every time a mother uses that water to prepare a meal safely, a life is preserved. That act of preservation is recorded on your scale of good deeds as a continuous mercy. Preservation of life is one of the aims of Islam as defined in the objectives of the Shari'ah. 

Alhamdulillah, through your unwavering generosity, One Ummah has provided millions of litres of water to crisis zones worldwide. But as temperatures peak this summer, the demand in Gaza is greater than ever before. 

Help Families Affected by the Gaza Water Crisis 

We cannot rebuild Gaza's entire water grid overnight, but we can ensure that a water truck arrives at a camp today. We can ensure that Ibtisam, Hanadi, and millions like them do not have to watch their children suffer from preventable diseases caused by dirty water. 

Your support through the Drops of Mercy campaign directly funds these vital deliveries. 

[Donate to the Drops of Mercy Appeal Now] 

Rewards are anchored in the sincerity of your intention. Whether you contribute a small sum or fund large scale deliveries, your charity brings hope to brothers and sisters who feel forgotten by the world. 

Do not let the mothers of Gaza search in vain tomorrow morning. Extend your hand, share your blessings, and provide the Drops of Mercy that save lives today. 

[Donate to the Drops of Mercy Appeal Now] 

(Please note: This appeal is not Zakat applicable. Any surplus funds will be placed into our general water fund to support water projects across our active operational areas.) 

This video highlights the dire water situation in Gaza and shows how aid organisations deliver clean drinking water to displaced families using emergency water trucks. 

The Struggle of Finding Water in Gaza 

Gaza Water Crisis: Families Rely on Emergency Water Trucks 

One Ummah Water Distribution in Gaza