People fleeing from the southern Gaza city of Rafah have described arriving in Khan Younis only to find it "completely destroyed," with dire living conditions.
The UN’s agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) estimates nearly 110,000 people have fled Rafah since Monday, after the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) issued an evacuation order. Many of them arrived in Khan Younis, only to reach an area already devastated by war.
“We came here to Khan Younis displaced from Rafah only to find that Khan Younis is completely destroyed from top to bottom," a woman named Amana Al-Shagleh told CNN.
"There are no schools, or houses or even a small place to take us in, here we are in the street."
Amana added that her family had left Rafah under the bombardment, which was a "horror scene."
Another man named Fayez Abu Amsha, originally a resident of Beit Hanoun in northern Gaza, told CNN that he and his family were told to flee to Rafah in the early days of the war.
Amsha and his family fled to Khan Younis to find an UNRWA school in the city "totally and completely destroyed and uninhabitable."
"I have managed to sweep a classroom for my family and children and daughters and their families in some classrooms.”
Another elderly lady named Fatama Al-Masri, from Beit Hanoun, described dire living conditions in Khan Younis, including no water electricity or running water, and being left with no choice but to "defecate on the dirt."