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It was about 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I returned home in Gaza City. A strong wind was blowing, making it impossible to remain any longer, leaving me to walk. In the beginning, it was merely a soft rain, but a short distance later the rain became a downpour. It came as no shock. 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 while I stood there, though he didn’t seem interested. I observed the cookies were poorly packaged in plastic, dampened from the drizzle, and I questioned if he’d manage to sell them all before the night ended. A deep chill permeated the air.

A Walk Through a Landscape of Tents

As I walked along al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, makeshift shelters crowded both sides of the road. There were no voices from inside them, only the sound of rain pouring down and the whistle of the wind. Rushing forward, trying to dodge the rain, I activated my mobile phone's torch to light my way. I couldn't stop thinking to those taking refuge within: What are they doing now? What is their state of mind? How do they feel? The cold was piercing. I imagined children huddled under damp covers, parents shifting constantly to keep them warm.

Upon opening the door to my apartment, the cold metal served as a quiet but powerful reminder of the suffering faced across Gaza in these severe cold season. I entered my apartment and felt consumed by the guilt of possessing shelter when so many were exposed to the storm.

The Darkness Worsens

As midnight passed, the storm grew stronger. Outside, plastic sheeting on broken panes sagged and flapped violently, while corrugated metal tore loose and crashed to the ground. Overriding the noise came the desperate, terrified shouts of children, cutting through the darkness. I felt completely helpless.

Over the past two weeks, the rain has been unending. Chilly, dense, and propelled by strong winds, it has flooded makeshift homes, swamped refugee areas and turned bare earth into mud. In other places, this might be called “poor conditions”. In Gaza, it is endured in a state of exposure and abandonment.

The Cruelest Season

Residents refer to this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the fourty most severe days of winter, commencing 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. Typically, it is faced with preparation and shelter. Currently, Gaza has none of these. The chill penetrates through homes, streets are empty and people simply endure.

But the threat posed by the cold is no longer abstract. On the Sunday morning before Christmas, civil defense teams found the victims of two children after the roof of a bombarded structure collapsed in northern Gaza, freeing five additional individuals, including a child and two women. Two people have not been found. Such collapses are not new attacks, but the result of homes weakened by months of bombardment and finally undone by winter rain. Earlier this month, a young child 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. Thin plastic sheets strained under the weight of water, mattresses were adrift and clothes hung damply, always damp. Each step reinforced how precarious these dwellings are and how close the rain and cold came to taking life and health for countless individuals living in tents and cramped refuges.

The majority of these individuals have already been forced from their homes, many repeatedly. Homes are destroyed. Neighbourhoods flattened. Winter has arrived in Gaza, but defense against it has not. It has come without proper shelter, in darkness, devoid of warmth.

A Teacher's Anguish

As a university lecturer in Gaza, this weather causes deep concern. My students are not mere statistics; they are young people I speak to; smart, persistent, but deeply weary. Most attend online classes from tents; others from overcrowded shelters where solitude is unattainable and connectivity sporadic. Countless learners have already suffered personal loss. Most have seen their houses destroyed. Yet they still try to study. Their resilience is extraordinary, but it ought not be necessary in this way.

In Gaza, what would typically constitute routine academic practices—assignments, deadlines—become moral negotiations, dictated every moment by concern for students’ security, heat and access to shelter.

During nights like these, I am constantly preoccupied about them. Is their shelter holding? Are they warm? Did the wind tear through their shelter while they were trying to sleep? For those remaining in apartments, or the shells that are left, there is a lack of heat. With electricity mostly absent and fuel rare, warmth comes mainly from wearing multiple layers and using the few bedding items available. Nonetheless, cold nights are excruciating. How then those living in tents?

The Humanitarian Shortfall

Reports indicate that well over a million people in Gaza live in shelters. Aid supplies, including weatherproof shelters, have been far from enough. Amid the last tempest, relief groups reported delivering coverings, shelters and sleeping materials to numerous households. In reality, however, this assistance was widely experienced as patchy and insufficient, limited to band-aid measures that offered scant protection against prolonged exposure to cold, wind and rain. Tents collapse. Chest infections, hypothermia, and infections caused by damp conditions are on the upswing.

This is not an surprise calamity. Winter is an annual event. People in Gaza interpret this shortcoming not as misfortune, but as being forsaken. People speak of how essential materials are blocked or slowed, while attempts to reinforce weakened structures are frequently blocked. Local initiatives have tried to find solutions, to hand out tarps, yet they remain limited by restrictions on imports. The culpability lies in political and humanitarian. Remedies are known, but are withheld.

A Preventable Suffering

The aspect that renders this pain especially heartbreaking is how unnecessary it should be. No one should have to study, raise children, or fight illness standing knee-high in cold water inside a tent. No learner should dread the rain damaging their precious phone. Rain exposes just how fragile life has become. It tests bodies worn down by anxiety, fatigue, and loss.

This year's chill occurs alongside the Christmas season that, for millions, epitomizes warmth, refuge and care for the neediest. In Palestine, that {symbolism