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The clock read approximately 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I headed back home in Gaza City. Gusts of wind blew, forcing me inside any longer, leaving me to walk. Initially, it was only a light drizzle, but after about 200 metres the rain suddenly grew heavier. It came as no shock. I stopped near a tent, clapping my hands to draw some warmth. A young boy was sitting outside selling sweet treats. We shared brief remarks during my pause, although he appeared disengaged. I noticed 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. The freezing temperature invaded every space.

A Journey Through a Place of Tents

As I walked along al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, canvas structures flanked both sides of the road. There were no voices from inside them, merely the din of falling water and the roar of the wind. Quickening my pace, attempting to avoid the rain, I activated my mobile phone's torch to light my way. My mind continually drifted to those sheltering inside: What occupies them now? What is their state of mind? How do they feel? The cold was piercing. I imagined children curled under damp covers, parents shifting constantly to keep them warm.

When I opened the door to my apartment, the freezing handle served as a subtle yet haunting reminder of the suffering faced across Gaza in these brutal winter climate. I walked into 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

As midnight passed, the storm intensified. Outside, makeshift covers on shattered windows sagged and flapped violently, while corrugated metal broke away and crashed to the ground. Above it all came the piercing, fearful cries of children, shattering the darkness. I felt completely helpless.

During recent days, the rain has been unending. Cold, heavy, and driven by strong winds, it has flooded makeshift homes, flooded makeshift camps and turned open ground into mud. In different contexts, this might be called “inclement weather”. In Gaza, it is lived with exposure and abandonment.

Al-Arba’iniya

Locals call this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the 40 coldest and harshest days of winter, beginning in late December and lasting until the end of January. It is the definite start of winter, the moment when the season unleashes its intensity. Normally, it is weathered through preparation and shelter. Now, Gaza has no such defenses. The frost seeps through homes, streets are empty and people simply endure.

But the danger of winter is now very real. In the early hours of Sunday before Christmas, rescue operations recovered the bodies of two children after the roof of a shelled home collapsed in northern Gaza, rescuing five others, including a child and two women. Two people remain missing. Such collapses are not new attacks, but the outcome of homes damaged from months of bombardment and succumbing to winter rain. Not long ago, a young child in Khan Younis died of exposure to the cold.

Fragile Shelters

Walking past the camp nearest my home, I observed the results up close. Thin plastic sheets strained under the weight of water, mattresses bobbed in water and clothes hung damply, always damp. Each step reminded me how vulnerable these tents are and how close the rain and cold came to claiming life and health for a vast population living in tents and cramped refuges.

Most of these people have already been uprooted, many repeatedly. Homes are lost. Neighbourhoods razed. Winter has arrived in Gaza, but defense against it has not. It has come devoid of safe refuge, with no power, lacking heat.

The Weight on Education

As a university lecturer in Gaza, this weather is a heavy burden. My students are not distant names; they are faces I recognize; intelligent, determined, but profoundly exhausted. Most participate in digital sessions from tents; others from cramped quarters where personal space doesn't exist and connectivity unreliable. A significant number of pupils have already experienced bereavement. Most have lost their homes. Yet they continue their education. Their resilience is extraordinary, but it ought not be necessary in this way.

In Gaza, what would typically constitute routine academic practices—assignments, deadlines—transform into questions of conscience, influenced daily by uncertainty about students’ safety, warmth and access to shelter.

On evenings such as this, I find myself thinking about them. Are they dry? Is there heat? Could the storm have shredded through their shelter while they were trying to sleep? For those still living in apartments, or damaged structures, there is a lack of heat. With electricity mostly absent and fuel scarce, warmth comes primarily through donning extra clothing and using any remaining covers. Even so, cold nights are intolerable. How then those living in tents?

Political Failure

Figures show that more than a million people in Gaza live in shelters. Relief items, including insulated tents, have been far from enough. When the cyclone hit, aid organizations reported delivering tarpaulins, tents and bedding to numerous households. In reality, however, this assistance was often perceived as patchy and insufficient, limited to temporary solutions that did little against ongoing suffering 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 understand this failure not as misfortune, but as neglect. People speak of how critical supplies are hindered or postponed, while attempts to fix broken houses are consistently hampered. Community efforts have tried to make do, to provide coverings, yet they remain limited by what is allowed to enter. The culpability lies in political and humanitarian. Remedies are known, but are kept out.

A Preventable Suffering

The aspect that renders this pain especially heartbreaking is how avoidable it could have been. No individual ought to study, raise children, or battle sickness standing ankle-deep in cold water inside a tent. No student should fear the rain ruining their last notebook. Rain reveals just how vulnerable survival is. It challenges health worn down by anxiety, fatigue, and loss.

The current cold season aligns with the Christmas season that, for millions, epitomizes warmth, refuge and care for the most vulnerable. In Palestine, that {symbolism