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The clock read about 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I headed back home in Gaza City. The wind howled, forcing me inside any longer, so walking was my only option. At first, it was just a gentle sprinkle, but following a brief walk the rain became a downpour. That wasn’t surprising. I paused beside a tent, clapping my hands to fight off the chill. A young boy sat nearby selling baked goods. We spoke briefly while I stood there, though he didn’t seem interested. I saw the cookies were hastily covered in plastic, dampened from the drizzle, and I wondered if he’d have enough to sell before the night ended. A deep chill permeated the air.

A Trek Through a Landscape of Tents

As I walked along al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, canvas structures flanked both sides of the road. An eerie silence replaced voices from inside them, only the sound of torrential rain and the whistle of the wind. Rushing forward, attempting to avoid the rain, I switched on my mobile phone's torch to see the road ahead. My thoughts kept returning to those taking refuge within: What are they doing now? What are they thinking? What are they experiencing? It was bitterly cold. I imagined children huddled under damp covers, parents adjusting repeatedly to keep them warm.

As I unlocked the door to my apartment, the cold metal served as a quiet but powerful reminder of the struggles borne across Gaza in these severe cold season. I walked into my apartment and was overwhelmed by the guilt of enjoying a dry home when a multitude remained unprotected to the storm.

The Midnight Hour Escalates

In the middle of the night, the storm reached its peak. Outside, plastic sheeting on broken panes sagged and flapped violently, while corrugated metal tore loose and fell with a clatter. Overriding the noise came the desperate, terrified shouts of children, shattering the darkness. I felt totally incapable.

For the last fortnight, the rain has been unending. Chilly, dense, and propelled by strong winds, it has soaked tents, flooded makeshift camps and turned the soil into mud. In other places, this might be called “inclement weather”. In Gaza, it is endured in a state of exposure and abandonment.

The Cruelest Season

Palestinians know this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the fourty most severe days of winter, beginning in late December and persisting to the end of January. It is the definite start of winter, the moment when the season shows its true power. Ordinarily, it is weathered through preparation and shelter. Now, Gaza has neither. The cold bites through homes, streets are vacant and people merely survive.

But the peril of the season is far from theoretical. Early on the Sunday before Christmas, civil defense teams recovered the bodies of two children after the roof of a bombarded structure collapsed in northern Gaza, freeing five additional individuals, including a child and two women. Two people are still unaccounted for. Such collapses are not the result of fresh strikes, but the outcome of homes damaged from months of bombardment and succumbing to winter rain. In recent days, an infant in Khan Younis died of exposure to the cold.

Precarious Existence

Observing the camp nearest my home, I saw the consequences up close. Inadequate coverings strained under the weight of water, mattresses floated and clothes were perpetually moist, incapable of drying. Each step reminded me how vulnerable these tents are and how close the rain and cold came to taking life and health for a vast population living in tents and cramped refuges.

The majority of these individuals have already been uprooted, many several times over. Homes are lost. Neighbourhoods razed. Winter has come to Gaza, but shelter from its fury has not. It has come devoid of safe refuge, with no power, lacking heat.

Students in the Storm

In my role as a professor in Gaza, this weather causes deep concern. My students are not distant names; they are faces I recognize; smart, persistent, but profoundly exhausted. Most join virtual lessons from tents; others from overcrowded shelters where personal space doesn't exist and connectivity sporadic. A significant number of pupils have already experienced bereavement. Most have been rendered homeless. Yet they persist in learning. Their fortitude is remarkable, but it ought not be necessary in this way.

In Gaza, what would normally count as routine academic practices—tasks, schedules—become ethical dilemmas, shaped each day by anxiety over students’ security, heat and ability to find refuge.

On evenings such as this, I cannot help but wonder about them. Do they have dryness? 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 scarce, warmth comes mainly from wearing multiple layers and using whatever blankets are left. Despite this, cold nights are excruciating. What about those living in tents?

Political Failure

Figures show that well over a million people in Gaza live in shelters. Aid supplies, including weatherproof shelters, have been inadequate. During the recent storm, relief groups reported distributing tarpaulins, tents and bedding to a multitude of people. In reality, however, this assistance was frequently felt to be patchy and insufficient, limited to band-aid measures that did little against extended hardship to cold, wind and rain. Structures give way. Sicknesses, hypothermia, and infections caused by damp conditions are increasing.

This cannot be described as an surprise calamity. Winter arrives cyclically. People in Gaza understand this failure not as fate, but as neglect. People speak of how necessary items are blocked or slowed, while attempts to fix broken houses are repeatedly obstructed. Grassroots projects have tried to find solutions, to provide coverings, yet they continue to be hampered by restrictions on imports. The culpability lies in political and humanitarian. Solutions exist, but are kept out.

An Unnecessary Pain

The aspect that renders this pain especially painful is how avoidable it could have been. No one should have to study, raise children, or combat disease standing surrounded by cold water inside a tent. No learner should dread the rain destroying their final textbook. Rain lays bare just how vulnerable survival is. It strains physiques worn down by pressure, weariness, and sorrow.

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