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It was about 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I returned home in Gaza City. Gusts of wind blew, forcing me inside any longer, so walking was my only option. In the beginning, it was only a light drizzle, but following a brief walk the rain became a downpour. That wasn’t surprising. I stopped near a tent, rubbing my palms together to draw some warmth. A young boy was sitting outside selling homemade cookies. We spoke briefly while I stood there, but his attention was elsewhere. I noticed the cookies were poorly packaged in plastic, already soggy from the drizzle, and I questioned if he’d find buyers before the night ended. The freezing temperature invaded every space.

A Trek Through a Place of Tents

Walking down al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, makeshift shelters crowded both sides of the road. No sounds of conversation came from inside them, just the noise of falling water and the roar of the wind. Rushing forward, seeking escape from the rain, I switched on my mobile phone's torch to light my way. My thoughts kept returning to those taking refuge within: What occupies them now? What is their state of mind? What emotions do they hold? A severe chill gripped the air. I imagined children curled under wet blankets, parents shifting constantly to keep them warm.

When I opened the door to my apartment, the cold metal served as a subtle yet haunting reminder of the struggles borne across Gaza in these severe cold season. I entered my apartment and was overwhelmed by the guilt of enjoying a dry home when countless others faced exposure to the storm.

The Midnight Hour Escalates

During the darkest hours, the storm grew stronger. Outside, makeshift covers 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, piercing 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, swamped refugee areas and turned open ground into mud. In other places, this might be called “poor conditions”. In Gaza, it is endured in a state of exposure and abandonment.

Al-Arba’iniya

Palestinians know this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the 40 coldest and harshest days of winter, starting from late December and lasting until the end of January. It is the real onset of winter, the moment when the season unleashes its intensity. Ordinarily, it is faced with preparation and shelter. Now, Gaza has no such defenses. The chill penetrates through homes, streets are vacant and people simply endure.

But the danger of winter is no longer abstract. In the early hours of Sunday before Christmas, civil defense teams recovered the bodies of two children after the roof of a bombarded structure collapsed in northern Gaza, saving five more people, including a child and two women. Two people remain missing. Such collapses are not new attacks, but the consequence of homes weakened by months of bombardment and ultimately defeated by winter rain. In recent days, an eight-month-old baby girl in Khan Younis succumbed to exposure to the cold.

Fragile Shelters

Observing the camp nearest my home, I witnessed the impact up close. Flimsy tarpaulins sagged under the weight of water, mattresses bobbed in water and clothes hung damply, incapable of drying. Each step reinforced how vulnerable these tents are and how close the rain and cold came to claiming life and health for hundreds of thousands living in tents and packed sanctuaries.

The majority of these individuals have already been forced from their homes, many several times over. Homes are destroyed. Neighbourhoods razed. Winter has come to Gaza, but protection from it has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, with no power, without heating.

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 young people I speak to; bright, resilient, but profoundly exhausted. Most attend online classes from tents; others from packed rooms where solitude is unattainable and connectivity intermittent. Countless learners have already experienced bereavement. Most have lost their homes. Yet they still try to study. Their perseverance is astounding, but it ought not be necessary in this way.

In Gaza, what would usually be routine academic practices—tasks, schedules—transform into moral negotiations, influenced daily by uncertainty about students’ security, heat and proximity to protection.

When the storm rages, I am constantly preoccupied about them. Do they have dryness? Are they warm? Did the wind tear through their shelter while they were trying to sleep? For those still living in apartments, or what remains of them, there is an absence of warmth. With electricity largely unavailable and fuel in short supply, warmth comes primarily through wearing multiple layers and using the few bedding items available. Nonetheless, cold nights are intolerable. What, then those living in tents?

Political Failure

Figures show that over a million people in Gaza exist in makeshift accommodations. Humanitarian assistance, including insulated tents, have been insufficient. Amid the last tempest, humanitarian partners reported distributing coverings, shelters and sleeping materials to a multitude of people. For those affected, however, this assistance was often perceived as patchy and insufficient, limited to short-term fixes that offered scant protection against prolonged exposure to cold, wind and rain. Shelters fail. Respiratory illnesses, hypothermia, and infections associated with damp conditions are increasing.

This cannot be described as an unforeseen disaster. Winter arrives cyclically. People in Gaza understand this failure not as bad luck, but as abandonment. People speak of how essential materials are hindered or postponed, while attempts to repair damaged homes are consistently hampered. Grassroots projects have tried to find solutions, to hand out tarps, 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 Preventable Suffering

The factor that intensifies this hardship especially heartbreaking is how preventable it is. No individual ought to study, raise children, or combat disease standing ankle-deep in cold water inside a tent. It is wrong for a pupil to worry about the rain damaging their precious phone. Rain exposes just how precarious existence is. It tests bodies 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