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The clock read about 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I made my way home in Gaza City. Gusts of wind blew, making it impossible to remain any longer, leaving me to walk. Initially, it was only a light drizzle, but a short distance later the rain became a downpour. That wasn’t surprising. I took shelter by a tent, clapping my hands to fight off the chill. A young boy had positioned himself selling baked goods. We spoke briefly during my pause, but his attention was elsewhere. I saw the cookies were poorly packaged in plastic, already soggy from the drizzle, and I questioned if he’d manage to sell them all before the night ended. The cold seeped into everything.

A Walk Through a Place of Tents

As I walked along al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, tents lined both sides of the road. There were no 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 switched on my mobile phone's torch to light my way. My thoughts kept returning to those huddled within: What occupies them now? What are they thinking? What emotions do they hold? It was bitterly cold. I imagined children nestled under damp covers, parents adjusting repeatedly to keep them warm.

Upon opening the door to my apartment, the icy doorknob served as a subtle yet haunting reminder of the struggles borne across Gaza in these severe cold season. I entered my apartment and felt consumed by the guilt of possessing shelter when countless others faced exposure to the storm.

The Night Escalates

As midnight passed, the storm reached its peak. Outside, plastic sheeting on damaged glass whipped and strained, while tin roofing broke away and crashed to the ground. Above it all came the desperate, terrified shouts of children, cutting through the darkness. I felt completely helpless.

For the last fortnight, the rain has been incessant. Freezing, pouring, and carried by strong winds, it has flooded makeshift homes, swamped refugee areas 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 Harshest Days

Residents refer to this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the fourty most severe days of winter, commencing in late December and lasting until the end of January. It is the real onset of winter, the moment when the season reveals its full force. Ordinarily, it is faced with preparation and shelter. This year, Gaza has neither. The chill penetrates through homes, streets are vacant and people merely survive.

But the peril of the season is now very real. On the Sunday morning 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 new attacks, but the consequence of homes damaged from months of bombardment and ultimately defeated by winter rain. In recent days, a young child in Khan Younis died of exposure to the cold.

A Life in Tents

Observing the camp nearest my home, I observed the results up close. Flimsy tarpaulins sagged under the weight of water, mattresses floated and clothes hung damply, never fully drying. Each step reinforced how vulnerable these tents are and how close the rain and cold threatened life and health for hundreds of thousands living in tents and cramped refuges.

A great number of these residents have already been displaced, many repeatedly. Homes are gone. Neighbourhoods flattened. Winter has arrived in 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 young people I speak to; bright, resilient, but profoundly exhausted. Most attend online classes from tents; others from packed rooms where personal space doesn't exist and connectivity unreliable. Many of my students 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 questions of conscience, influenced daily by anxiety over students’ well-being, comfort and access to shelter.

When the storm rages, I find myself thinking about them. Is their shelter holding? Is there heat? Did the wind tear through their shelter while they were trying to sleep? For those still living in apartments, or damaged structures, there is no heating. With electricity mostly absent and fuel scarce, warmth comes mainly from donning extra clothing and using whatever blankets are left. Despite this, cold nights are intolerable. How then those living in tents?

The Humanitarian Shortfall

Agencies state that over a million people in Gaza live in shelters. Humanitarian assistance, including insulated tents, have been inadequate. During the recent storm, aid organizations reported distributing plastic sheets, tents and mattresses to a multitude of people. On the ground, however, this assistance was widely experienced as inconsistent and lacking, limited to short-term fixes that offered scant protection against prolonged exposure to cold, wind and rain. Structures give way. Chest infections, hypothermia, and infections linked to damp conditions are increasing.

This is not an surprise calamity. Winter is an annual event. People in Gaza view this crisis not as fate, but as neglect. People speak of how critical supplies are restricted or delayed, while attempts to reinforce weakened structures are consistently hampered. Local initiatives have tried to improvise, to hand out tarps, yet they continue to be hampered by what is allowed to enter. The root cause is political and humanitarian. Solutions exist, but are prevented from arriving.

An Unnecessary Pain

What makes this suffering especially agonizing 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. No student should fear the rain damaging their precious phone. Rain exposes just how fragile life has become. It tests bodies worn down by pressure, weariness, and sorrow.

This year's chill coincides with the Christmas season that, for millions, represents warmth, refuge and care for the disadvantaged. In Palestine, that {symbolism