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The time was about 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I returned home in Gaza City. Gusts of wind blew, making it impossible to remain any longer, leaving me to walk. In the beginning, it was just a gentle sprinkle, but after about 200 metres the rain became a downpour. This was expected. I paused beside a tent, trying to warm my hands to generate a little heat. A young boy had positioned himself selling sweet treats. We shared brief remarks while I stood there, but his attention was elsewhere. I saw the cookies were poorly packaged in plastic, dampened from the drizzle, and I pondered if he’d manage to sell them all before the night ended. A deep chill permeated the air.

A Walk Through a City of Tents

Walking down al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, tents lined both sides of the road. No sounds of conversation came from inside them, just the noise of torrential rain and the moan of the wind. Rushing forward, seeking escape from the rain, I switched on my mobile phone's torch to see the road ahead. I couldn't stop thinking to those huddled within: How are they passing the time now? What is their state of mind? What emotions do they hold? It was bitterly cold. I envisioned children nestled under damp covers, parents adjusting repeatedly to keep them warm.

As I unlocked the door to my apartment, the freezing handle served as a quiet but powerful reminder of the hardships endured across Gaza in these harsh winter conditions. I walked into my apartment and was overwhelmed by the guilt of enjoying a dry home when so many were exposed to the storm.

The Night Worsens

As midnight passed, the storm grew stronger. Outside, makeshift covers on broken panes billowed and tore, while tin roofing ripped free and slammed down. Above it all came the piercing, fearful cries of children, shattering the darkness. I felt utterly powerless.

For the last fortnight, the rain has been unending. Chilly, dense, and propelled by strong winds, it has soaked tents, inundated temporary settlements and turned the soil into mud. In other places, this might be called “bad weather”. In Gaza, it is experienced amidst exposure and abandonment.

The Cruelest Season

Residents refer to this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the fourty most severe days of winter, starting from late December and continuing through the end of January. It is the real onset of winter, the moment when the season shows its true power. Normally, it is faced with preparation and shelter. This year, Gaza has no such defenses. The frost seeps through homes, streets are vacant and people simply endure.

But the peril of the season is no longer abstract. On the Sunday morning before Christmas, rescue operations retrieved the remains 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 are still unaccounted for. Such collapses are not caused by ongoing hostilities, but the outcome of homes weakened by months of bombardment and finally undone by winter rain. Earlier this month, an infant in Khan Younis succumbed to exposure to the cold.

Fragile Shelters

Observing the camp nearest my home, I observed the results up close. Flimsy tarpaulins sagged under the weight of water, mattresses were adrift and clothes remained wet, never fully drying. Each step reinforced how precarious these dwellings are and how close the rain and cold came to claiming life and health for countless individuals living in tents and packed sanctuaries.

Most of these people have already been forced from their homes, many several times over. Homes are destroyed. Neighbourhoods leveled. Winter has arrived in Gaza, but shelter from its fury has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, without electricity, lacking heat.

A Teacher's Anguish

Being an educator in Gaza, this weather is a heavy burden. My students are not mere statistics; they are faces I recognize; intelligent, determined, but deeply weary. Most attend online classes from tents; others from overcrowded shelters where solitude is unattainable and connectivity sporadic. A significant number of pupils have already suffered personal loss. Most have lost their homes. Yet they still try to study. Their perseverance is astounding, but it should not be required in this way.

In Gaza, what would usually be routine academic practices—tasks, schedules—turn into moral negotiations, dictated every moment by concern for students’ security, heat and access to shelter.

On evenings such as this, I am constantly preoccupied about them. Do they have dryness? Do they feel any warmth? 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 a lack of heat. With electricity mostly absent and fuel in short supply, warmth comes mostly via donning extra clothing and using any remaining covers. Despite this, cold nights are excruciating. How then those living in tents?

Aid and Abandonment

Agencies state that more than a million people in Gaza live in shelters. Humanitarian assistance, including weatherproof shelters, have been inadequate. When the cyclone hit, aid organizations reported distributing coverings, shelters and sleeping materials to a multitude of people. In reality, however, this assistance was often perceived as patchy and insufficient, limited to band-aid measures that did little against prolonged exposure to cold, wind and rain. Tents collapse. Chest infections, hypothermia, and infections associated with damp conditions are rising.

This cannot be described as an surprise calamity. Winter arrives cyclically. People in Gaza interpret this shortcoming not as fate, but as being forsaken. People speak of how critical supplies are hindered or postponed, while attempts to repair damaged homes are consistently hampered. Grassroots projects have tried to make do, to distribute plastic sheeting, yet they are still constrained by restrictions on imports. The failure is political and humanitarian. Answers are available, but are kept out.

An Unnecessary Pain

What makes this suffering especially agonizing is how preventable it is. No individual ought 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 vulnerable survival is. It strains physiques worn down by pressure, weariness, and sorrow.

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