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The clock read about 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I headed back home in Gaza City. Gusts of wind blew, forcing me inside any longer, so walking was my only option. Initially, it was merely a soft rain, but following a brief walk the rain became a downpour. This was expected. I took shelter by a tent, clapping my hands to draw some warmth. A young boy had positioned himself selling sweet treats. We exchanged a few words as I waited, although he appeared disengaged. I observed the cookies were loosely wrapped in plastic, moist from the drizzle, and I wondered 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, canvas structures flanked both sides of the road. There were no voices from inside them, only the sound of falling water and the whistle of the wind. Quickening my pace, trying to dodge the rain, I turned on my mobile phone's torch to see the road ahead. My mind continually drifted to those huddled within: How are they passing the time now? What is their state of mind? How do they feel? It was bitterly cold. I imagined children nestled under wet blankets, parents shifting constantly to keep them warm.

When I opened the door to my apartment, the icy doorknob served as a quiet but powerful reminder of the hardships endured across Gaza in these brutal winter climate. I walked into my apartment and felt consumed by the guilt of possessing shelter when a multitude remained unprotected to the storm.

The Darkness Intensifies

During the darkest hours, the storm reached its peak. Outside, makeshift covers on broken panes sagged and flapped violently, while tin roofing ripped free and slammed down. Overriding the noise came the sharp, panicked screams of children, cutting through the darkness. I felt utterly powerless.

During recent days, the rain has been incessant. Freezing, pouring, and carried by strong winds, it has soaked tents, flooded makeshift camps and turned open ground into mud. Elsewhere, this might be called “poor conditions”. In Gaza, it is endured in a state of exposure and abandonment.

The Cruelest Season

Residents refer to this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the fourty most severe days of winter, commencing in late December and persisting to the end of January. It is the real onset of winter, the moment when the season reveals its full force. Normally, it is weathered through preparation and shelter. Now, Gaza has none of these. The cold bites through homes, streets are empty and people simply endure.

But the peril of the season is no longer abstract. On the Sunday morning before Christmas, civil defense teams recovered the bodies of two children after the roof of a war-damaged building 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 result of homes damaged from months of bombardment and finally undone by winter rain. Not long ago, a young child in Khan Younis died of exposure to the cold.

Precarious Existence

Walking past the camp nearest my home, I witnessed the impact up close. Thin plastic sheets sagged under the weight of water, mattresses bobbed in water and clothes were perpetually moist, incapable of drying. Each step reinforced how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold came to taking life and health for countless individuals living in tents and packed sanctuaries.

The majority of these individuals have already been displaced, many on multiple occasions. Homes are lost. Neighbourhoods flattened. Winter has come to Gaza, but defense against it has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, in darkness, lacking heat.

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; smart, persistent, but deeply weary. 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 continue their education. 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—become questions of conscience, dictated every moment by anxiety over students’ well-being, comfort and access to shelter.

When the storm rages, I am constantly preoccupied about them. Are they dry? Is there heat? Could the storm have shredded through their shelter during the night? For those remaining in apartments, or what remains of them, there is no heating. With electricity mostly absent and fuel in short supply, warmth comes mainly from donning extra clothing and using the few bedding items available. Even so, cold nights are excruciating. How then those living in tents?

Political Failure

Figures show that more than a million people in Gaza reside in temporary housing. Relief items, including thermal blankets, have been insufficient. Amid the last tempest, humanitarian partners reported providing coverings, shelters and sleeping materials to a multitude of people. On the ground, however, this assistance was often perceived as uneven and inadequate, limited to temporary solutions that offered scant protection against extended hardship to cold, wind and rain. Structures give way. Sicknesses, hypothermia, and infections linked to damp conditions are on the upswing.

This cannot be described as an unforeseen disaster. Winter arrives cyclically. People in Gaza interpret this shortcoming not as fate, but as abandonment. People speak of how necessary items are blocked or slowed, while attempts to repair damaged homes are repeatedly obstructed. Local initiatives have tried to make do, to distribute plastic sheeting, yet they remain limited by what is allowed to enter. The root cause is political and humanitarian. Answers are available, but are withheld.

A Preventable Suffering

The aspect that renders this pain especially agonizing is how unnecessary it should be. No individual ought to study, raise children, or battle sickness standing surrounded by cold water inside a tent. No learner should dread the rain damaging their precious phone. Rain lays bare just how fragile life has become. It tests bodies worn down by stress, exhaustion, and grief.

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