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The clock read about 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I made my way home in Gaza City. A strong wind was blowing, forcing me inside any longer, leaving me to walk. In the beginning, it was just a gentle sprinkle, but following a brief walk the rain intensified abruptly. This was expected. I took shelter by a tent, rubbing my palms together to generate a little heat. A young boy had positioned himself selling homemade cookies. We shared brief remarks as I waited, though he didn’t seem interested. I observed the cookies were hastily covered in plastic, moist from the drizzle, and I pondered if he’d have enough to sell before the night ended. The freezing temperature invaded every space.

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, merely the din of falling water and the roar of the wind. Quickening my pace, trying to dodge the rain, I activated my mobile phone's torch to light my way. My thoughts kept returning to those huddled within: What are they doing now? What is their state of mind? How do they feel? The cold was piercing. I pictured children huddled under damp covers, parents moving restlessly to keep them warm.

As I unlocked the door to my apartment, the icy doorknob served as a quiet but powerful reminder of the suffering faced across Gaza in these harsh winter conditions. I stepped inside 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 intensified. Outside, tarps on damaged glass billowed and tore, while corrugated metal broke away and crashed to the ground. Overriding the noise came the sharp, panicked screams of children, piercing the darkness. I felt totally incapable.

During recent days, the rain has been unending. Freezing, pouring, and carried by strong winds, it has soaked tents, inundated temporary settlements and turned open ground into mud. In other places, this might be called “poor conditions”. In Gaza, it is experienced amidst exposure and abandonment.

Al-Arba’iniya

Residents refer to this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the most bitter forty days of winter, beginning in late December and lasting until the end of January. It is the real onset of winter, the moment when the season unleashes its intensity. Ordinarily, it is endured with preparation and shelter. Now, Gaza has neither. The frost seeps through homes, streets are deserted and people simply endure.

But the peril of the season is no longer abstract. On the Sunday morning before Christmas, recovery efforts retrieved the remains of two children after the roof of a bombarded structure collapsed in northern Gaza, saving five more people, including a child and two women. Two people have not been found. These structural failures are not new attacks, but the result of homes weakened by months of bombardment and succumbing to winter rain. Not long ago, an infant in Khan Younis passed away from exposure to the cold.

A Life in Tents

Passing by the camp nearest my home, I saw the consequences up close. Thin plastic sheets strained under the weight of water, mattresses floated and clothes were perpetually moist, incapable of drying. Each step reinforced how precarious these dwellings are and how close the rain and cold came to claiming life and health for a vast population living in tents and cramped refuges.

The majority of these individuals have already been uprooted, many several times over. Homes are gone. Neighbourhoods leveled. Winter has descended upon Gaza, but protection from it has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, with no power, devoid of warmth.

A Teacher's Anguish

In my role as a professor in Gaza, this weather causes deep concern. My students are not distant names; they are young people I speak to; smart, persistent, but extremely fatigued. Most join virtual lessons from tents; others from cramped quarters where solitude is unattainable and connectivity sporadic. Countless learners have already lost family members. Most have lost their homes. Yet they continue their education. 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 moral negotiations, dictated every moment by anxiety over students’ security, heat and ability to find refuge.

During nights like these, I am constantly preoccupied about them. Is their shelter holding? Is there heat? Has the gale ripped through their shelter during the night? For those remaining in apartments, or damaged structures, there is no heating. With electricity mostly absent and fuel in short supply, warmth comes primarily through bundling up and using any remaining covers. Nonetheless, cold nights are unbearable. What, then those living in tents?

The Humanitarian Shortfall

Figures show that more than a million people in Gaza exist in makeshift accommodations. Relief items, including weatherproof shelters, have been insufficient. Amid the last tempest, relief groups reported providing plastic sheets, tents and mattresses to a multitude of people. On the ground, however, this assistance was often perceived as inconsistent and lacking, limited to short-term fixes that offered scant protection against extended hardship to cold, wind and rain. Shelters fail. Respiratory illnesses, hypothermia, and infections linked to damp conditions are increasing.

This is not an unexpected catastrophe. Winter arrives cyclically. People in Gaza view this crisis not as fate, but as being forsaken. People speak of how essential materials are restricted or delayed, while attempts to fix broken houses are consistently hampered. Community efforts have tried to improvise, to provide coverings, yet they remain limited by restrictions on imports. The failure is political and humanitarian. Remedies are known, but are withheld.

An Unnecessary Pain

The aspect that renders this pain especially painful is how preventable it is. No individual ought to study, raise children, or battle sickness standing surrounded by cold water inside a tent. No student should fear the rain destroying their final textbook. Rain exposes just how fragile life has become. It strains physiques worn down by stress, exhaustion, and grief.

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