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It was about 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I returned home in Gaza City. The wind howled, and I couldn’t stay out any longer, so I had to walk. At first, it was merely a soft rain, but after about 200 metres the rain became a downpour. This was expected. I took shelter by a tent, rubbing my palms together to generate a little heat. A young boy had positioned himself selling baked goods. We exchanged a few words as I waited, though he didn’t seem interested. I saw the cookies were poorly packaged in plastic, already soggy from the drizzle, and I wondered if he’d have enough to sell before the night ended. The freezing temperature invaded every space.

A Walk Through a Place of Tents

While traversing al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, makeshift shelters crowded both sides of the road. An eerie silence replaced voices from inside them, just the noise of torrential rain and the moan of the wind. Quickening my pace, attempting to avoid the rain, I turned on my mobile phone's torch to light my way. My thoughts kept returning to those taking refuge within: What occupies them now? What are they thinking? What are they experiencing? It was bitterly cold. I pictured children nestled under soaked bedding, parents adjusting repeatedly to keep them warm.

Upon opening the door to my apartment, the cold metal served as a subtle yet haunting reminder of the hardships endured across Gaza in these harsh winter conditions. I stepped inside my apartment and was overwhelmed by the guilt of having a roof when countless others faced exposure to the storm.

The Night Escalates

In the middle of the night, the storm grew stronger. Outside, tarps on damaged glass sagged and flapped violently, while tin roofing broke away and slammed down. Above it all came the piercing, fearful cries of children, cutting through the darkness. I felt completely helpless.

Over the past two weeks, the rain has been unending. Freezing, pouring, and carried by strong winds, it has soaked tents, flooded makeshift camps and turned bare earth into mud. Elsewhere, this might be called “inclement weather”. In Gaza, it is experienced amidst exposure and abandonment.

The Harshest Days

Residents refer to this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the 40 coldest and harshest days of winter, starting from late December and lasting until the end of January. It is the real onset of winter, the moment when the season unleashes its intensity. Typically, it is faced with preparation and shelter. Now, Gaza has no such defenses. The chill penetrates through homes, streets are empty and people merely survive.

But the danger of winter is far from theoretical. On the Sunday morning before Christmas, recovery efforts retrieved the remains of two children after the roof of a shelled home collapsed in northern Gaza, saving five more people, including a child and two women. Two people have not been found. Such collapses are not the result of fresh strikes, but the result of homes damaged from months of bombardment and finally undone by winter rain. Not long ago, an eight-month-old baby girl in Khan Younis passed away from exposure to the cold.

Fragile Shelters

Walking past the camp nearest my home, I saw the consequences up close. Flimsy tarpaulins buckled beneath the weight of water, mattresses were adrift and clothes hung damply, always damp. Each step highlighted 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 overcrowded shelters.

The majority of these individuals have already been forced from their homes, many on multiple occasions. Homes are destroyed. Neighbourhoods leveled. Winter has descended upon Gaza, but protection from it has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, in darkness, without heating.

Students in the Storm

As a university lecturer in Gaza, this weather weighs heavily on me. My students are not mere statistics; they are individuals I know; bright, resilient, but deeply weary. Most attend online classes from tents; others from packed rooms where solitude is unattainable and connectivity intermittent. A significant number of pupils have already lost family members. Most have been rendered homeless. Yet they still try to study. Their fortitude is remarkable, but it should not be required in this way.

In Gaza, what would typically constitute routine academic practices—assignments, deadlines—become questions of conscience, influenced daily by uncertainty about students’ well-being, comfort and proximity to protection.

When the storm rages, I find myself thinking about them. Is their shelter holding? Are they warm? Could the storm have shredded through their shelter while they were trying to sleep? For those residing in apartments, or damaged structures, there is a lack of heat. With electricity scarce and fuel in short supply, warmth comes mostly via bundling up and using any remaining covers. Nonetheless, cold nights are excruciating. What about those living in tents?

Aid and Abandonment

Figures show that over a million people in Gaza live in shelters. Relief items, including insulated tents, have been far from enough. During the recent storm, humanitarian partners reported providing plastic sheets, tents and mattresses to a multitude of people. For those affected, however, this assistance was frequently felt to be uneven and inadequate, limited to temporary solutions that did little against ongoing suffering to cold, wind and rain. Tents collapse. Respiratory illnesses, hypothermia, and infections associated with damp conditions are on the upswing.

This cannot be described as an surprise calamity. Winter arrives cyclically. People in Gaza understand this failure not as misfortune, but as neglect. People speak of how necessary items are restricted or delayed, while attempts to fix broken houses are frequently blocked. Community efforts have tried to find solutions, to provide coverings, yet they remain limited by bureaucratic barriers. The failure is political and humanitarian. Remedies are known, but are kept out.

A Symbolic Season

The factor that intensifies this hardship especially heartbreaking is how avoidable it could have been. No one should have to study, raise children, or fight illness standing ankle-deep in cold water inside a tent. It is wrong for a pupil to worry about the rain destroying their final textbook. Rain exposes just how fragile life has become. It strains physiques worn down by anxiety, fatigue, and loss.

The current cold season aligns with the Christmas season that, for millions, epitomizes warmth, refuge and care for the disadvantaged. In Palestine, that {symbolism