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It was about 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I returned home in Gaza City. Gusts of wind blew, making it impossible to remain any longer, so I had to walk. At first, it was only a light drizzle, but after about 200 metres the rain suddenly grew heavier. It came as no shock. I paused beside a tent, clapping my hands to draw some warmth. A young boy was sitting outside selling homemade cookies. We exchanged a few words during my pause, but his attention was elsewhere. I observed the cookies were hastily covered in plastic, moist from the drizzle, and I pondered if he’d manage to sell them all before the night ended. A deep chill permeated the air.

A Walk Through a City of Tents

Walking down al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, tents lined both sides of the road. An eerie silence replaced voices from inside them, merely the din of falling water and the roar of the wind. Quickening my pace, attempting to avoid the rain, I activated my mobile phone's torch to see the road ahead. My mind continually drifted to those taking refuge within: How are they passing the time now? What thoughts fill their minds? How do they feel? It was bitterly cold. I imagined children huddled under soaked bedding, parents adjusting repeatedly to keep them warm.

When I opened the door to my apartment, the icy doorknob served as a subtle yet haunting reminder of the suffering faced across Gaza in these brutal winter climate. I stepped inside my apartment and was overwhelmed by the guilt of possessing shelter when a multitude remained unprotected to the storm.

The Midnight Hour Worsens

In the middle of the night, the storm intensified. Outside, plastic sheeting on shattered windows whipped and strained, while corrugated metal ripped free and fell with a clatter. Overriding the noise came the sharp, panicked screams of children, shattering the darkness. I felt utterly powerless.

For the last fortnight, the rain has been unending. Freezing, pouring, and carried by strong winds, it has flooded makeshift homes, inundated temporary settlements and turned open ground into mud. In different contexts, this might be called “inclement 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, starting from late December and continuing through the end of January. It is the true beginning of winter, the moment when the season shows its true power. Normally, it is faced with preparation and shelter. Now, Gaza has none of these. The frost seeps through homes, streets are vacant and people simply endure.

But the threat posed by the cold is now very real. On the Sunday morning before Christmas, civil defense teams recovered the bodies of two children after the roof of a shelled home collapsed in northern Gaza, rescuing five others, including a child and two women. Two people have not been found. These incidents are not the result of fresh strikes, but the consequence of homes weakened by months of bombardment and ultimately defeated by winter rain. In recent days, an eight-month-old baby girl in Khan Younis died of exposure to the cold.

Fragile Shelters

Observing the camp nearest my home, I witnessed the impact up close. Flimsy tarpaulins buckled beneath the weight of water, mattresses bobbed in water and clothes remained wet, incapable of drying. Each step reminded me how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold came to claiming life and health for a vast population living in tents and packed sanctuaries.

A great number of these residents have already been uprooted, many repeatedly. Homes are lost. Neighbourhoods flattened. Winter has descended upon Gaza, but defense against it has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, without electricity, without heating.

The Weight on Education

In my role as a professor in Gaza, this weather is a heavy burden. My students are not figures in a report; they are young people I speak to; intelligent, determined, but deeply weary. Most attend online classes from tents; others from packed rooms where solitude is unattainable and connectivity sporadic. Countless learners have already lost family members. Most have seen their houses destroyed. Yet they persist in learning. Their resilience is extraordinary, but it must not be demanded in this way.

In Gaza, what would normally count as routine academic practices—assignments, deadlines—transform into ethical dilemmas, dictated every moment by concern for students’ security, heat and proximity to protection.

When the storm rages, I am constantly preoccupied about them. Do they have dryness? Do they feel any warmth? Did the wind tear through their shelter as they attempted to rest? For those still living in apartments, or the shells that are left, there is an absence of warmth. With electricity mostly absent and fuel scarce, warmth comes mainly from bundling up and using whatever blankets are left. Nonetheless, cold nights are excruciating. What, then those living in tents?

Aid and Abandonment

Reports indicate that well over a million people in Gaza reside in temporary housing. Humanitarian assistance, including insulated tents, have been insufficient. Amid the last tempest, relief groups reported distributing coverings, shelters and sleeping materials to a multitude of people. On the ground, however, this assistance was frequently felt to be inconsistent and lacking, limited to temporary solutions that offered scant protection against prolonged exposure to cold, wind and rain. Tents collapse. Chest infections, hypothermia, and infections associated with damp conditions are increasing.

This cannot be described as an surprise calamity. Winter is an annual event. People in Gaza view this crisis not as bad luck, but as being forsaken. People speak of how necessary items are hindered or postponed, while attempts to repair damaged homes are frequently blocked. Grassroots projects have tried to make do, to hand out tarps, yet they are still constrained by bureaucratic barriers. The failure is political and humanitarian. Remedies are known, but are kept out.

A Preventable Suffering

What makes this suffering especially painful is how preventable it is. No one should have to study, raise children, or battle sickness standing knee-high in cold water inside a tent. No learner should dread the rain damaging their precious phone. Rain lays bare just how vulnerable survival is. It tests bodies worn down by stress, exhaustion, and grief.

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