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It was approximately 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I headed back home in Gaza City. A strong wind was blowing, and I couldn’t stay out any longer, leaving me to walk. Initially, it was merely a soft rain, but following a brief walk the rain intensified abruptly. This was expected. I took shelter by a tent, rubbing my palms together to draw some warmth. A young boy sat nearby selling homemade cookies. We exchanged a few words during my pause, though he didn’t seem interested. I noticed the cookies were poorly packaged in plastic, already soggy from the drizzle, and I pondered if he’d find buyers before the night ended. The freezing temperature invaded every space.

A Trek Through a Landscape of Tents

While traversing al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, tents lined both sides of the road. There were no voices from inside them, merely the din of falling water and the moan of the wind. Rushing forward, attempting to avoid the rain, I turned on my mobile phone's torch to light my way. My mind continually drifted to those huddled within: What occupies them now? What are they thinking? What emotions do they hold? It was bitterly cold. I imagined children curled under soaked bedding, parents adjusting repeatedly to keep them warm.

As I unlocked the door to my apartment, the freezing handle served as a subtle yet haunting reminder of the struggles borne across Gaza in these harsh winter conditions. I walked into my apartment and was overwhelmed by the guilt of enjoying a dry home when countless others faced exposure to the storm.

The Midnight Hour Escalates

As midnight passed, the storm grew stronger. Outside, tarps on damaged glass sagged and flapped violently, while corrugated metal broke away and slammed down. Overriding the noise came the desperate, terrified shouts of children, cutting through the darkness. I felt utterly powerless.

During recent days, the rain has been relentless. Cold, heavy, and driven by strong winds, it has drenched shelters, flooded makeshift camps and turned open ground into mud. In different contexts, this might be called “bad weather”. In Gaza, it is experienced amidst exposure and abandonment.

The Cruelest Season

Palestinians know this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the 40 coldest and harshest days of winter, commencing in late December and persisting to the end of January. It is the definite start of winter, the moment when the season reveals its full force. Normally, it is faced with preparation and shelter. Now, Gaza has no such defenses. The chill penetrates through homes, streets are vacant and people just persevere.

But the danger of winter is no longer abstract. On the Sunday morning before Christmas, rescue operations recovered the bodies 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 new attacks, but the consequence of homes damaged from months of bombardment and finally undone by winter rain. In recent days, an infant in Khan Younis succumbed to exposure to the cold.

Precarious Existence

Walking past the camp nearest my home, I saw the consequences up close. Flimsy tarpaulins strained under the weight of water, mattresses were adrift and clothes hung damply, never fully drying. Each step reinforced how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold came to claiming life and health for hundreds of thousands living in tents and packed sanctuaries.

Most of these people have already been uprooted, many repeatedly. Homes are destroyed. Neighbourhoods razed. Winter has descended upon Gaza, but defense against it has not. It has come devoid of safe refuge, in darkness, without heating.

A Teacher's Anguish

As a university lecturer in Gaza, this weather causes deep concern. My students are not distant names; they are individuals I know; smart, persistent, but extremely fatigued. Most participate in digital sessions from tents; others from cramped quarters where solitude is unattainable and connectivity intermittent. Countless learners have already lost family members. Most have seen their houses destroyed. Yet they persist in learning. Their perseverance is astounding, but it must not be demanded in this way.

In Gaza, what would normally count as routine academic practices—assignments, deadlines—become questions of conscience, dictated every moment by anxiety over students’ well-being, comfort and access to shelter.

When the storm rages, I find myself thinking about them. Do they have dryness? Do they feel any warmth? Has the gale ripped through their shelter during the night? For those remaining in apartments, or the shells that are left, there is an absence of warmth. With electricity mostly absent and fuel in short supply, warmth comes mainly from donning extra clothing and using any remaining covers. Even so, cold nights are excruciating. What about those living in tents?

Political Failure

Agencies state that well over a million people in Gaza exist in makeshift accommodations. Relief items, including thermal blankets, have been insufficient. During the recent storm, relief groups reported distributing plastic sheets, tents and mattresses to a multitude of people. On the ground, however, this assistance was frequently felt to be inconsistent and lacking, limited to short-term fixes that were largely ineffective against extended hardship to cold, wind and rain. Tents collapse. Respiratory illnesses, hypothermia, and infections linked to damp conditions are on the upswing.

This is not an surprise calamity. Winter comes every year. People in Gaza understand this failure not as fate, but as abandonment. People speak of how critical supplies are restricted or delayed, while attempts to repair damaged homes are repeatedly obstructed. Local initiatives have tried to make do, to hand out tarps, yet they are still constrained by restrictions on imports. The failure is political and humanitarian. Solutions exist, but are kept out.

An Unnecessary Pain

The factor that intensifies this hardship especially heartbreaking is how unnecessary it should be. No one should have to study, raise children, or combat disease standing ankle-deep in cold water inside a tent. No student should fear the rain destroying their final textbook. Rain exposes just how vulnerable survival is. It strains physiques worn down by stress, exhaustion, and grief.

The current cold season occurs alongside the Christmas season that, for millions, represents warmth, refuge and care for the most vulnerable. In Palestine, that {symbolism