Amid Israel's bombardment of Gaza that has followed Hamas' Oct. 7 attack, much of the enclave's already fragile infrastructure — water and electricity, as well as housing, hospitals, and schools — has been either damaged or destroyed.

A joint report by the European Union, the World Bank and the United Nations published in March concluded that as of January, direct damage to Gaza's infrastructure amounted to $18.5 billion.

Only a third of the enclave's hospitals are functioning at all, with those remaining crippled by a lack of fuel to run generators, says Juliette Touma, the communications director for UNRWA, the U.N. agency that delivers aid to Gaza.