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The time was around 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I headed back home in Gaza City. A strong wind was blowing, and I couldn’t stay out any longer, so I had to walk. Initially, it was merely a soft rain, but a short distance later the rain became a downpour. This was expected. I stopped near a tent, clapping my hands to generate a little heat. A young boy sat nearby selling homemade cookies. We exchanged a few words during my pause, though he didn’t seem interested. I noticed 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. The cold seeped into everything.

A Trek Through a Place of Tents

As I walked along al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, tents lined both sides of the road. No sounds of conversation came from inside them, merely the din of falling water and the whistle of the wind. As I hurried on, seeking escape from 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 is their state of mind? What are they experiencing? It was bitterly cold. I imagined children curled under wet blankets, parents moving restlessly to keep them warm.

When I opened the door to my apartment, the icy doorknob served as a quiet but powerful reminder of the struggles borne across Gaza in these brutal winter climate. I stepped inside my apartment and was overwhelmed by the guilt of possessing shelter when so many were exposed to the storm.

The Midnight Hour Worsens

In the middle of the night, the storm grew stronger. Outside, makeshift covers on damaged glass billowed and tore, while metal sheets tore loose and slammed down. Above it all came the desperate, terrified shouts of children, shattering the darkness. I felt totally incapable.

Over the past two weeks, the rain has been incessant. Freezing, pouring, and carried by strong winds, it has soaked tents, 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, starting from late December and lasting until the end of January. It is the definite start of winter, the moment when the season reveals its full force. Typically, it is endured with preparation and shelter. This year, Gaza has neither. The chill penetrates through homes, streets are deserted and people just persevere.

But the danger of winter 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, saving five more people, including a child and two women. Two people have not been found. These structural failures are not new attacks, but the outcome of homes compromised after months of bombardment and ultimately defeated by winter rain. Not long ago, an infant in Khan Younis succumbed to exposure to the cold.

Precarious Existence

Walking past the camp nearest my home, I observed the results up close. Flimsy tarpaulins strained under the weight of water, mattresses floated and clothes were perpetually moist, never fully drying. Each step reminded me how precarious these dwellings are and how close the rain and cold came to taking life and health for a vast population living in tents and overcrowded shelters.

The majority of these individuals have already been displaced, many several times over. Homes are gone. Neighbourhoods leveled. Winter has come to Gaza, but protection from it has not. It has come without proper shelter, in darkness, lacking heat.

A Teacher's Anguish

In my role as a professor in Gaza, this weather weighs heavily on me. My students are not mere statistics; they are young people I speak to; intelligent, determined, but deeply weary. Most join virtual lessons from tents; others from packed rooms where personal space doesn't exist and connectivity sporadic. Countless learners have already experienced bereavement. Most have lost their homes. Yet they continue their education. Their resilience is extraordinary, but it must not be demanded in this way.

In Gaza, what would usually be routine academic practices—assignments, deadlines—become ethical dilemmas, shaped each day by uncertainty about students’ security, heat and access to shelter.

During nights like these, I find myself thinking about them. Do they have dryness? Are they warm? Did the wind tear through their shelter as they attempted to rest? For those residing in apartments, or the shells that are left, there is a lack of heat. With electricity largely unavailable and fuel rare, warmth comes primarily through wearing multiple layers and using whatever blankets are left. Nonetheless, cold nights are intolerable. What, then those living in tents?

Political Failure

Reports indicate that more than a million people in Gaza live in shelters. Humanitarian assistance, including thermal blankets, have been insufficient. When the cyclone hit, humanitarian partners reported distributing tarpaulins, tents and bedding to numerous households. In reality, however, this assistance was widely experienced as patchy and insufficient, limited to short-term fixes that were largely ineffective against ongoing suffering to cold, wind and rain. Structures give way. Sicknesses, hypothermia, and infections caused by damp conditions are rising.

This is not an unexpected catastrophe. Winter arrives cyclically. People in Gaza understand this failure not as fate, but as being forsaken. People speak of how essential materials are hindered or postponed, while attempts to fix broken houses are consistently hampered. Community efforts have tried to find solutions, to provide coverings, yet they remain limited by what is allowed to enter. The root cause is political and humanitarian. Solutions exist, but are prevented from arriving.

A Symbolic Season

The aspect that renders this pain especially painful is how preventable it is. It is unconscionable to study, raise children, or fight illness standing surrounded by cold water inside a tent. No learner should dread the rain ruining their last notebook. Rain reveals just how precarious existence is. It challenges health worn down by stress, exhaustion, and grief.

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