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The time was about 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I made my way home in Gaza City. A strong wind was blowing, and I couldn’t stay out any longer, so I had to walk. Initially, it was just a gentle sprinkle, but a short distance later the rain suddenly grew heavier. It came as no shock. I paused beside a tent, rubbing my palms together to fight off the chill. A young boy had positioned himself selling baked goods. We exchanged a few words while I stood there, although he appeared disengaged. I observed the cookies were poorly packaged in plastic, moist from the drizzle, and I questioned if he’d manage to sell them all before the night ended. The freezing temperature invaded every space.

A Trek Through a City of Tents

As I walked along al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, tents lined both sides of the road. No sounds of conversation came from inside them, only the sound of torrential rain and the roar of the wind. As I hurried on, trying to dodge the rain, I activated my mobile phone's torch to see the road ahead. I couldn't stop thinking to those taking refuge within: What are they doing now? What is their state of mind? What emotions do they hold? It was bitterly cold. I pictured children huddled under wet blankets, parents adjusting repeatedly to keep them warm.

As I unlocked the door to my apartment, the cold metal served as a subtle yet haunting reminder of the suffering faced across Gaza in these harsh winter conditions. I stepped inside my apartment and was overwhelmed by the guilt of enjoying a dry home when countless others faced exposure to the storm.

The Darkness Worsens

During the darkest hours, the storm grew stronger. Outside, plastic sheeting on shattered windows sagged and flapped violently, while corrugated metal broke away and fell with a clatter. Overriding the noise came the desperate, terrified shouts of children, piercing the darkness. I felt totally incapable.

Over the past two weeks, the rain has been incessant. Cold, heavy, and driven by strong winds, it has drenched shelters, flooded makeshift camps and turned the soil into mud. In different contexts, this might be called “bad weather”. In Gaza, it is lived with exposure and abandonment.

The Harshest Days

Palestinians know this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the most bitter forty days of winter, beginning in late December and persisting to the end of January. It is the real onset of winter, the moment when the season shows its true power. Typically, it is endured with preparation and shelter. Currently, Gaza has none of these. The chill penetrates through homes, streets are deserted and people merely survive.

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 shelled home collapsed in northern Gaza, rescuing five others, including a child and two women. Two people have not been found. These structural failures are not caused by ongoing hostilities, but the outcome of homes compromised after months of bombardment and ultimately defeated by winter rain. In recent days, an infant in Khan Younis passed away from 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 were perpetually moist, incapable of drying. Each step highlighted how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold came to taking life and health for a vast population living in tents and overcrowded shelters.

The majority of these individuals have already been displaced, many repeatedly. Homes are gone. Neighbourhoods flattened. Winter has descended upon Gaza, but shelter from its fury 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 young people I speak to; bright, resilient, but deeply weary. Most attend online classes from tents; others from packed rooms where solitude is unattainable and connectivity unreliable. Many of my students have already lost family members. Most have lost their homes. Yet they persist in learning. Their fortitude is remarkable, but it ought not be necessary in this way.

In Gaza, what would usually be routine academic practices—assignments, deadlines—become questions of conscience, dictated every moment by uncertainty about students’ security, heat and access to shelter.

When the storm rages, I cannot help but wonder about them. Is their shelter holding? Do they feel any warmth? Has the gale ripped through their shelter during the night? For those still living in apartments, or damaged structures, there is no heating. With electricity scarce and fuel scarce, warmth comes mainly from bundling up and using the few bedding items available. Nonetheless, cold nights are excruciating. How then those living in tents?

Political Failure

Agencies state that more than a million people in Gaza exist in makeshift accommodations. Humanitarian assistance, including thermal blankets, have been insufficient. When the cyclone hit, aid organizations reported providing coverings, shelters and sleeping materials to numerous households. On the ground, however, this assistance was widely experienced as uneven and inadequate, limited to short-term fixes that did little against ongoing suffering to cold, wind and rain. Structures give way. Chest infections, hypothermia, and infections linked to damp conditions are rising.

This is not an unforeseen disaster. Winter arrives cyclically. People in Gaza understand this failure not as fate, but as being forsaken. People speak of how necessary items are restricted or delayed, while attempts to reinforce weakened structures are repeatedly obstructed. Community efforts have tried to improvise, to provide coverings, yet they remain limited by what is allowed to enter. The failure is political and humanitarian. Answers are available, but are kept out.

A Symbolic Season

The aspect that renders this pain especially heartbreaking is how preventable it is. It is unconscionable to study, raise children, or combat disease standing knee-high in cold water inside a tent. No learner should dread the rain ruining their last notebook. Rain reveals just how fragile life has become. It tests bodies worn down by stress, exhaustion, and grief.

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