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The clock read around 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I made my way home in Gaza City. A strong wind was blowing, forcing me inside any longer, so I had to walk. In the beginning, it was just a gentle sprinkle, but after about 200 metres the rain suddenly grew heavier. This was expected. I paused beside a tent, trying to warm my hands to draw some warmth. A young boy sat nearby selling homemade cookies. We spoke briefly while I stood there, but his attention was elsewhere. I saw the cookies were loosely wrapped in plastic, already soggy from the drizzle, and I questioned if he’d find buyers before the night ended. The cold seeped into everything.

A Journey Through a City of Tents

While traversing 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 rain pouring down and the roar of the wind. Rushing forward, trying to dodge the rain, I switched on my mobile phone's torch to light my way. My thoughts kept returning to those huddled within: How are they passing the time now? What thoughts fill their minds? What emotions do they hold? A severe chill gripped the air. I pictured children curled under damp covers, parents adjusting repeatedly 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 severe cold season. I stepped inside my apartment and felt consumed by the guilt of having a roof when so many were exposed to the storm.

The Darkness Intensifies

During the darkest hours, the storm grew stronger. Outside, plastic sheeting on shattered windows sagged and flapped violently, while tin roofing tore loose and crashed to the ground. Overriding the noise came the piercing, fearful cries of children, piercing the darkness. I felt totally incapable.

For the last fortnight, the rain has been unending. Cold, heavy, and driven by strong winds, it has soaked tents, swamped refugee areas 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.

Al-Arba’iniya

Residents refer to 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 reveals its full force. Typically, it is faced with preparation and shelter. Currently, Gaza has neither. The cold bites through homes, streets are deserted and people simply endure.

But the danger of winter is far from theoretical. Early on the Sunday before Christmas, recovery efforts recovered the bodies of two children after the roof of a shelled home collapsed in northern Gaza, freeing five additional individuals, including a child and two women. Two people have not been found. 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, a young child in Khan Younis died of exposure to the cold.

Fragile Shelters

Observing the camp nearest my home, I saw the consequences up close. Inadequate coverings strained under the weight of water, mattresses bobbed in water and clothes were perpetually moist, always damp. Each step reminded me how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold threatened life and health for hundreds of thousands living in tents and overcrowded shelters.

A great number of these residents have already been displaced, many repeatedly. Homes are destroyed. Neighbourhoods razed. Winter has descended upon Gaza, but shelter from its fury has not. It has come devoid of safe refuge, without electricity, devoid of warmth.

A Teacher's Anguish

As a university lecturer in Gaza, this weather weighs heavily on me. My students are not figures in a report; they are individuals I know; intelligent, determined, but deeply weary. Most participate in digital sessions 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 seen their houses destroyed. Yet they continue their education. Their resilience is extraordinary, but it ought not be necessary in this way.

In Gaza, what would typically constitute routine academic practices—assignments, deadlines—become moral negotiations, influenced daily by anxiety over students’ well-being, comfort and access to shelter.

On evenings such as this, I am constantly preoccupied about them. Are they dry? Are they warm? Did the wind tear through their shelter while they were trying to sleep? For those remaining in apartments, or what remains of them, there is a lack of heat. With electricity scarce and fuel scarce, warmth comes mainly from wearing multiple layers and using any remaining covers. Despite this, cold nights are unbearable. How then those living in tents?

Political Failure

Reports indicate that more than a million people in Gaza exist in makeshift accommodations. Aid supplies, including thermal blankets, have been insufficient. During the recent storm, humanitarian partners reported providing plastic sheets, tents and mattresses to numerous households. In reality, however, this assistance was widely experienced as 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 caused by damp conditions are on the upswing.

This is not an unforeseen disaster. Winter is an annual event. People in Gaza view this crisis not as misfortune, but as being forsaken. People speak of how critical supplies are restricted or delayed, while attempts to reinforce weakened structures are consistently hampered. Community efforts have tried to find solutions, to hand out tarps, yet they are still constrained by what is allowed to enter. The failure is political and humanitarian. Remedies are known, but are withheld.

An Unnecessary Pain

The factor that intensifies this hardship especially painful is how preventable it is. It is unconscionable to study, raise children, or fight illness standing knee-high in cold water inside a tent. No learner should dread the rain ruining their last notebook. Rain lays bare just how precarious existence is. It strains physiques worn down by anxiety, fatigue, and loss.

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