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The clock read around 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I returned home in Gaza City. Gusts of wind blew, forcing me inside any longer, so I had to walk. In the beginning, it was just a gentle sprinkle, but following a brief walk the rain suddenly grew heavier. That wasn’t surprising. I stopped near a tent, rubbing my palms together to fight off the chill. A young boy sat nearby selling sweet treats. We spoke briefly while I stood there, though he didn’t seem interested. I saw the cookies were poorly packaged in plastic, dampened from the drizzle, and I questioned if he’d manage to sell them all before the night ended. The freezing temperature invaded every space.

A Journey Through a Landscape of Tents

As I walked along al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, makeshift shelters crowded both sides of the road. An eerie silence replaced voices from inside them, only the sound of falling water and the roar of the wind. As I hurried on, trying to dodge the rain, I activated my mobile phone's torch to illuminate the path. My mind continually drifted to those huddled within: What occupies them now? What are they thinking? How do they feel? It was bitterly cold. I pictured children huddled under soaked bedding, parents adjusting repeatedly to keep them warm.

As I unlocked the door to my apartment, the freezing handle served as a subtle yet haunting reminder of the suffering faced across Gaza in these severe cold season. I walked into my apartment and felt consumed by the guilt of enjoying a dry home when so many were exposed to the storm.

The Midnight Hour Escalates

As midnight passed, the storm reached its peak. Outside, tarps on shattered windows billowed and tore, while tin roofing broke away and slammed down. Overriding the noise came the sharp, panicked screams of children, cutting through the darkness. I felt completely helpless.

During recent days, the rain has been incessant. Freezing, pouring, and carried by strong winds, it has drenched shelters, flooded makeshift camps and turned bare earth into mud. Elsewhere, this might be called “poor conditions”. In Gaza, it is lived with exposure and abandonment.

The Cruelest Season

Residents refer to 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 true beginning of winter, the moment when the season shows its true power. Normally, it is weathered through preparation and shelter. Currently, Gaza has none of these. The frost seeps through homes, streets are empty and people just persevere.

But the danger of winter is no longer abstract. In the early hours of Sunday before Christmas, civil defense teams found the victims of two children after the roof of a war-damaged building collapsed in northern Gaza, rescuing five others, including a child and two women. Two people remain missing. These incidents are not new attacks, but the consequence of homes damaged from months of bombardment and succumbing to winter rain. In recent days, an eight-month-old baby girl in Khan Younis succumbed to exposure to the cold.

A Life in Tents

Observing the camp nearest my home, I observed the results up close. Thin plastic sheets buckled beneath the weight of water, mattresses floated and clothes hung damply, always damp. Each step highlighted how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold came to claiming life and health for hundreds of thousands living in tents and cramped refuges.

A great number of these residents have already been uprooted, many repeatedly. Homes are destroyed. Neighbourhoods razed. Winter has arrived in Gaza, but shelter from its fury has not. It has come without proper shelter, in darkness, without heating.

Students in the Storm

As a university lecturer in Gaza, this weather is a heavy burden. My students are not mere statistics; they are individuals I know; smart, persistent, but extremely fatigued. Most participate in digital sessions from tents; others from overcrowded shelters where solitude is unattainable and connectivity unreliable. A significant number of pupils have already lost family members. Most have lost their homes. Yet they persist in learning. Their perseverance is astounding, but it should not be required in this way.

In Gaza, what would typically constitute routine academic practices—assignments, deadlines—turn into ethical dilemmas, shaped each day by concern for students’ safety, warmth and proximity to protection.

On evenings such as this, I find myself thinking about them. Do they have dryness? Are they warm? Has the gale ripped through their shelter during the night? For those remaining in apartments, or what remains of them, there is an absence of warmth. With electricity largely unavailable and fuel in short supply, warmth comes mostly via wearing multiple layers and using any remaining covers. Even so, cold nights are excruciating. What, then those living in tents?

The Humanitarian Shortfall

Agencies state that more than a million people in Gaza live in shelters. Aid supplies, including insulated tents, have been insufficient. Amid the last tempest, aid organizations reported providing tarpaulins, tents and bedding to thousands of families. For those affected, however, this assistance was often perceived as patchy and insufficient, limited to short-term fixes that offered scant protection against extended hardship to cold, wind and rain. Tents collapse. Chest infections, hypothermia, and infections associated with damp conditions are increasing.

This cannot be described as an surprise calamity. Winter is an annual event. People in Gaza interpret this shortcoming not as bad luck, but as being forsaken. People speak of how essential materials are hindered or postponed, while attempts to reinforce weakened structures are repeatedly obstructed. Grassroots projects have tried to make do, to hand out tarps, yet they continue to be hampered by what is allowed to enter. The culpability lies in political and humanitarian. Remedies are known, but are withheld.

A Symbolic Season

The aspect that renders this pain especially painful is how unnecessary it should be. It is unconscionable to study, raise children, or battle sickness standing surrounded by cold water inside a tent. It is wrong for a pupil to worry about the rain destroying their final textbook. Rain exposes just how precarious existence is. It challenges health worn down by anxiety, fatigue, and loss.

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