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It was approximately 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I returned home in Gaza City. A strong wind was blowing, forcing me inside any longer, leaving me to walk. In the beginning, it was only a light drizzle, but following a brief walk the rain became a downpour. That wasn’t surprising. I paused beside a tent, clapping my hands to generate a little heat. A young boy sat nearby selling sweet treats. We spoke briefly while I stood there, though he didn’t seem interested. I observed the cookies were poorly packaged in plastic, dampened from the drizzle, and I wondered if he’d have enough to sell before the night ended. The freezing temperature invaded every space.

A Trek Through a Landscape of Tents

Walking down al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, makeshift shelters crowded both sides of the road. An eerie silence replaced voices from inside them, merely the din of torrential rain and the whistle of the wind. Quickening my pace, attempting to avoid the rain, I turned on my mobile phone's torch to see the road ahead. My thoughts kept returning to those sheltering inside: What are they doing now? What are they thinking? What are they experiencing? It was bitterly cold. I pictured children curled under damp covers, parents moving restlessly to keep them warm.

When I opened the door to my apartment, the cold metal served as a quiet but powerful reminder of the suffering faced across Gaza in these harsh winter conditions. I walked into my apartment and couldn't shake the guilt of having a roof when countless others faced exposure to the storm.

The Night Intensifies

During the darkest hours, the storm grew stronger. Outside, makeshift covers on shattered windows sagged and flapped violently, while tin roofing ripped free and slammed down. Overriding the noise came the piercing, fearful cries of children, shattering the darkness. I felt totally incapable.

For the last fortnight, the rain has been incessant. Chilly, dense, and propelled by strong winds, it has drenched shelters, swamped refugee areas and turned the soil into mud. In different contexts, this might be called “bad weather”. In Gaza, it is experienced amidst exposure and abandonment.

Al-Arba’iniya

Palestinians know this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the fourty most severe days of winter, starting from late December and continuing through the end of January. It is the real onset of winter, the moment when the season reveals its full force. Ordinarily, it is faced with preparation and shelter. Currently, Gaza has no such defenses. The frost seeps through homes, streets are vacant and people simply endure.

But the peril of the season is no longer abstract. Early on the Sunday before Christmas, rescue operations found the victims of two children after the roof of a war-damaged building collapsed in northern Gaza, freeing five additional individuals, including a child and two women. Two people remain missing. Such collapses are not the result of fresh strikes, but the consequence of homes damaged from months of bombardment and succumbing to winter rain. In recent days, an infant in Khan Younis passed away from exposure to the cold.

A Life in Tents

Observing the camp nearest my home, I observed the results up close. Thin plastic sheets sagged under the weight of water, mattresses bobbed in water and clothes hung damply, always damp. Each step reminded me how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold came to taking life and health for hundreds of thousands living in tents and cramped refuges.

The majority of these individuals have already been uprooted, many on multiple occasions. Homes are lost. Neighbourhoods leveled. Winter has arrived in Gaza, but defense against it has not. It has come without proper shelter, without electricity, devoid of warmth.

A Teacher's Anguish

As a university lecturer in Gaza, this weather causes deep concern. My students are not mere statistics; they are young people I speak to; intelligent, determined, but deeply weary. Most participate in digital sessions from tents; others from cramped quarters where solitude is unattainable and connectivity intermittent. Many of my students have already lost family members. Most have seen their houses destroyed. Yet they persist in learning. Their fortitude is remarkable, but it must not be demanded in this way.

In Gaza, what would normally count as routine academic practices—assignments, deadlines—transform into moral negotiations, dictated every moment by uncertainty about students’ security, heat and proximity to protection.

On evenings such as this, I am constantly preoccupied about them. Is their shelter holding? Are they warm? Has the gale ripped through their shelter during the night? For those still living in apartments, or the shells that are left, there is a lack of heat. With electricity mostly absent and fuel scarce, warmth comes mostly via bundling up and using whatever blankets are left. Nonetheless, cold nights are unbearable. How then those living in tents?

Aid and Abandonment

Reports indicate that over a million people in Gaza exist in makeshift accommodations. Humanitarian assistance, including thermal blankets, have been insufficient. Amid the last tempest, humanitarian partners reported delivering tarpaulins, tents and bedding to a multitude of people. For those affected, however, this assistance was often perceived as inconsistent and lacking, limited to band-aid measures that were largely ineffective against ongoing suffering to cold, wind and rain. Structures give way. Chest infections, hypothermia, and infections caused by damp conditions are increasing.

This cannot be described as an unforeseen disaster. Winter comes every year. People in Gaza interpret this shortcoming not as fate, but as being forsaken. People speak of how critical supplies are blocked or slowed, while attempts to repair damaged homes are frequently blocked. Local initiatives have tried to make do, to distribute plastic sheeting, yet they are still constrained by bureaucratic barriers. The root cause is political and humanitarian. Answers are available, but are withheld.

An Unnecessary Pain

What makes this suffering especially agonizing is how preventable it is. No individual ought to study, raise children, or combat disease standing surrounded by cold water inside a tent. No student should fear the rain destroying their final textbook. Rain lays bare just how precarious existence is. It strains physiques worn down by anxiety, fatigue, and loss.

This winter aligns with the Christmas season that, for millions, epitomizes warmth, refuge and care for the neediest. In Palestine, that {symbolism