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The time was around 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I headed back home in Gaza City. Gusts of wind blew, forcing me inside any longer, so walking was my only option. At first, it was merely a soft rain, but a short distance later the rain suddenly grew heavier. That wasn’t surprising. I took shelter by a tent, clapping my hands to generate a little heat. A young boy sat nearby selling homemade cookies. We exchanged a few words as I waited, but his attention was elsewhere. I observed the cookies were poorly packaged in plastic, dampened from the drizzle, and I wondered if he’d find buyers 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, canvas structures flanked both sides of the road. No sounds of conversation came from inside them, just the noise of torrential rain and the roar of the wind. As I hurried on, attempting to avoid the rain, I turned on my mobile phone's torch to illuminate the path. I couldn't stop thinking to those taking refuge within: What occupies them now? What thoughts fill their minds? What are they experiencing? It was bitterly cold. I envisioned children curled under damp covers, parents moving restlessly to keep them warm.

When I opened the door to my apartment, the icy doorknob served as a subtle yet haunting reminder of the suffering faced across Gaza in these brutal winter climate. I walked into my apartment and couldn't shake the guilt of enjoying a dry home when so many were exposed to the storm.

The Midnight Hour Escalates

During the darkest hours, the storm grew stronger. Outside, tarps on shattered windows whipped and strained, while metal sheets ripped free and slammed down. Overriding the noise came the desperate, terrified shouts of children, piercing the darkness. I felt completely helpless.

For the last fortnight, the rain has been relentless. Chilly, dense, and propelled by strong winds, it has drenched shelters, flooded makeshift camps and turned bare earth into mud. Elsewhere, this might be called “bad 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 40 coldest and harshest days of winter, commencing in late December and continuing through the end of January. It is the definite start of winter, the moment when the season shows its true power. Normally, it is weathered through preparation and shelter. Currently, Gaza has neither. The frost seeps through homes, streets are empty and people merely survive.

But the threat posed by the cold is now very real. On the Sunday morning 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 structural failures are not caused by ongoing hostilities, but the consequence of homes damaged from months of bombardment and ultimately defeated by winter rain. Earlier this month, an eight-month-old baby girl in Khan Younis died of exposure to the cold.

A Life in Tents

Passing by the camp nearest my home, I saw the consequences up close. Inadequate coverings buckled beneath the weight of water, mattresses were adrift and clothes remained wet, never fully drying. Each step reinforced how vulnerable these tents are and how close the rain and cold threatened life and health for a vast population living in tents and overcrowded shelters.

A great number of these residents have already been uprooted, many on multiple occasions. Homes are lost. Neighbourhoods leveled. Winter has come to Gaza, but defense against it has not. It has come devoid of safe refuge, with no power, devoid of warmth.

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 individuals I know; bright, resilient, but extremely fatigued. Most join virtual lessons from tents; others from overcrowded shelters where privacy is impossible and connectivity intermittent. A significant number of pupils have already suffered personal loss. Most have seen their houses destroyed. Yet they persist in learning. Their perseverance is astounding, but it should not be required in this way.

In Gaza, what would normally count as routine academic practices—tasks, schedules—become ethical dilemmas, dictated every moment by uncertainty about 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 still living in apartments, or damaged structures, there is a lack of heat. With electricity scarce and fuel rare, warmth comes mainly from bundling up and using any remaining covers. Nonetheless, cold nights are unbearable. What, then those living in tents?

Aid and Abandonment

Agencies state that over a million people in Gaza reside in temporary housing. Aid supplies, including thermal blankets, have been inadequate. When the cyclone hit, aid organizations reported distributing tarpaulins, tents and bedding to numerous households. For those affected, however, this assistance was widely experienced as inconsistent and lacking, limited to band-aid measures that offered scant protection against extended hardship to cold, wind and rain. Structures give way. Sicknesses, hypothermia, and infections linked to damp conditions are on the upswing.

This goes beyond an unexpected catastrophe. Winter comes every year. People in Gaza understand this failure not as bad luck, but as neglect. People speak of how critical supplies are hindered or postponed, while attempts to reinforce weakened structures are frequently blocked. Grassroots projects have tried to find solutions, to distribute plastic sheeting, yet they remain limited by what is allowed to enter. The culpability lies in political and humanitarian. Solutions exist, but are kept out.

A Symbolic Season

The factor that intensifies this hardship especially painful is how preventable it is. It is unconscionable to study, raise children, or battle sickness standing knee-high in cold water inside a tent. No student should fear the rain damaging their precious phone. Rain reveals just how precarious existence is. It strains physiques worn down by pressure, weariness, and sorrow.

The current cold season occurs alongside the Christmas season that, for millions, symbolises warmth, refuge and care for the disadvantaged. In Palestine, that {symbolism