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The clock read approximately 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, so walking was my only option. At first, it was merely a soft rain, but after about 200 metres the rain became a downpour. This was expected. I paused beside a tent, clapping my hands to draw some warmth. A young boy sat nearby selling homemade cookies. We spoke briefly during my pause, though he didn’t seem interested. I noticed the cookies were loosely wrapped in plastic, dampened from the drizzle, and I wondered if he’d find buyers before the night ended. The freezing temperature invaded every space.

A Journey Through a City of Tents

As I walked along al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, makeshift shelters crowded both sides of the road. No sounds of conversation came from inside them, only the sound of falling water and the roar of the wind. As I hurried on, attempting to avoid the rain, I switched on my mobile phone's torch to light my way. My mind continually drifted to those sheltering inside: How are they passing the time now? What are they thinking? How do they feel? The cold was piercing. I envisioned children nestled under wet blankets, parents moving restlessly to keep them warm.

Upon opening the door to my apartment, the cold metal served as a understated yet stark reminder of the hardships endured across Gaza in these severe cold season. I walked into my apartment and couldn't shake the guilt of enjoying a dry home when a multitude remained unprotected to the storm.

The Darkness Intensifies

In the middle of the night, the storm grew stronger. Outside, plastic sheeting on shattered windows whipped and strained, while tin roofing ripped free and fell with a clatter. Overriding the noise came the sharp, panicked screams of children, piercing the darkness. I felt completely helpless.

During recent days, the rain has been relentless. Freezing, pouring, and carried by strong winds, it has flooded makeshift homes, inundated temporary settlements and turned the soil into mud. In other places, this might be called “bad weather”. In Gaza, it is lived with 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. Typically, it is faced with preparation and shelter. This year, Gaza has no such defenses. The cold bites through homes, streets are empty and people simply endure.

But the peril of the season is no longer abstract. 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, saving five more people, including a child and two women. Two people have not been found. These incidents are not new attacks, but the consequence of homes damaged from months of bombardment and finally undone by winter rain. Earlier this month, an infant in Khan Younis died of exposure to the cold.

A Life in Tents

Observing the camp nearest my home, I saw the consequences up close. Thin plastic sheets strained under the weight of water, mattresses floated and clothes remained wet, incapable of drying. Each step highlighted how vulnerable these tents are and how close the rain and cold came to taking life and health for hundreds of thousands living in tents and overcrowded shelters.

A great number of these residents have already been forced from their homes, many on multiple occasions. Homes are gone. Neighbourhoods razed. Winter has arrived in Gaza, but defense against it has not. It has come devoid of safe refuge, in darkness, lacking heat.

Students in the Storm

As a university lecturer in Gaza, this weather weighs heavily on me. My students are not mere statistics; they are individuals I know; smart, persistent, but profoundly exhausted. Most participate in digital sessions from tents; others from cramped quarters where privacy is impossible and connectivity sporadic. A significant number of pupils have already suffered personal loss. 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 typically constitute routine academic practices—tasks, schedules—become moral negotiations, dictated every moment by concern for students’ well-being, comfort and ability to find refuge.

During nights like these, I am constantly preoccupied about them. Are they dry? Are they warm? Did the wind tear through their shelter during the night? For those residing in apartments, or what remains of them, there is a lack of heat. With electricity mostly absent and fuel rare, warmth comes mostly via bundling up and using any remaining covers. Nonetheless, cold nights are unbearable. What, then those living in tents?

Aid and Abandonment

Reports indicate that over a million people in Gaza live in shelters. Aid supplies, including insulated tents, have been far from enough. Amid the last tempest, aid organizations reported providing tarpaulins, tents and bedding to thousands of families. For those affected, however, this assistance was widely experienced as patchy and insufficient, limited to band-aid measures that offered scant protection against ongoing suffering to cold, wind and rain. Structures give way. Chest infections, hypothermia, and infections associated with damp conditions are increasing.

This is not an unforeseen disaster. Winter arrives cyclically. People in Gaza view this crisis not as bad luck, but as abandonment. People speak of how necessary items are blocked or slowed, while attempts to repair damaged homes are consistently hampered. Grassroots projects have tried to make do, to provide coverings, yet they are still constrained by bureaucratic barriers. The culpability lies in political and humanitarian. Solutions exist, but are kept out.

A Preventable Suffering

The aspect that renders this pain especially painful is how avoidable it could have been. No individual ought to study, raise children, or fight illness standing surrounded by cold water inside a tent. It is wrong for a pupil to worry about the rain ruining their last notebook. Rain reveals just how fragile life has become. It tests bodies worn down by anxiety, fatigue, and loss.

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