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The clock read around 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I headed back home in Gaza City. Gusts of wind blew, and I couldn’t stay out any longer, leaving me to walk. Initially, it was just a gentle sprinkle, but a short distance later the rain intensified abruptly. That wasn’t surprising. I paused beside a tent, clapping my hands to draw some warmth. A young boy had positioned himself selling sweet treats. We exchanged a few words as I waited, but his attention was elsewhere. I noticed the cookies were poorly packaged in plastic, already soggy from the drizzle, and I wondered if he’d find buyers before the night ended. The freezing temperature invaded every space.

A Trek Through a Place of Tents

Walking down al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, makeshift shelters crowded both sides of the road. There were no voices from inside them, merely the din of rain pouring down and the moan of the wind. Quickening my pace, seeking escape from the rain, I switched on my mobile phone's torch to light my way. I couldn't stop thinking to those huddled within: What are they doing now? What thoughts fill their minds? What emotions do they hold? A severe chill gripped the air. I pictured children huddled under soaked bedding, parents shifting constantly to keep them warm.

Upon opening 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 couldn't shake the guilt of possessing shelter when countless others faced exposure to the storm.

The Midnight Hour Worsens

As midnight passed, the storm grew stronger. Outside, plastic sheeting on broken panes whipped and strained, while tin roofing tore loose and slammed down. Cutting through the chaos came the piercing, fearful cries of children, shattering the darkness. I felt utterly powerless.

Over the past two weeks, the rain has been unending. Cold, heavy, and driven by strong winds, it has flooded makeshift homes, swamped refugee areas and turned bare earth into mud. In different contexts, this might be called “inclement weather”. In Gaza, it is endured in a state of exposure and abandonment.

The Cruelest Season

Locals call this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the fourty most severe days of winter, starting from late December and lasting until the end of January. It is the definite start of winter, the moment when the season unleashes its intensity. Ordinarily, it is endured with preparation and shelter. Currently, Gaza has neither. The chill penetrates through homes, streets are deserted and people merely survive.

But the peril of the season is far from theoretical. On the Sunday morning before Christmas, civil defense teams retrieved the remains of two children after the roof of a bombarded structure collapsed in northern Gaza, rescuing five others, including a child and two women. Two people have not been found. These incidents are not new attacks, but the consequence of homes compromised after months of bombardment and finally undone by winter rain. Not long ago, a young child in Khan Younis passed away from exposure to the cold.

Precarious Existence

Observing the camp nearest my home, I observed the results up close. Thin plastic sheets sagged under the weight of water, mattresses were adrift and clothes remained wet, always damp. Each step highlighted how vulnerable these tents are and how close the rain and cold came to claiming life and health for countless individuals living in tents and overcrowded shelters.

The majority of these individuals have already been uprooted, many repeatedly. Homes are destroyed. Neighbourhoods leveled. Winter has descended upon Gaza, but defense against it has not. It has come devoid of safe refuge, with no power, lacking heat.

Students in the Storm

In my role as a professor in Gaza, this weather weighs heavily on me. My students are not figures in a report; they are faces I recognize; intelligent, determined, but profoundly exhausted. Most join virtual lessons from tents; others from packed rooms where solitude is unattainable and connectivity unreliable. A significant number of pupils have already experienced bereavement. Most have lost their homes. Yet they persist in learning. Their fortitude is remarkable, but it should not be required in this way.

In Gaza, what would normally count as routine academic practices—assignments, deadlines—become ethical dilemmas, dictated every moment by concern for students’ well-being, comfort and proximity to protection.

When the storm rages, I am constantly preoccupied about them. Is their shelter holding? Are they warm? Could the storm have shredded through their shelter as they attempted to rest? For those still living in apartments, or the shells that are left, there is an absence of warmth. With electricity scarce and fuel rare, warmth comes mostly via donning extra clothing and using whatever blankets are left. Even so, cold nights are intolerable. What, then those living in tents?

The Humanitarian Shortfall

Reports indicate that over a million people in Gaza exist in makeshift accommodations. Relief items, including weatherproof shelters, have been far from enough. Amid the last tempest, relief groups reported providing coverings, shelters and sleeping materials to thousands of families. For those affected, however, this assistance was widely experienced as patchy and insufficient, limited to temporary solutions that did little against extended hardship to cold, wind and rain. Shelters fail. Sicknesses, hypothermia, and infections associated with damp conditions are rising.

This goes beyond an surprise calamity. Winter arrives cyclically. People in Gaza understand this failure not as misfortune, but as being forsaken. People speak of how essential materials are blocked or slowed, while attempts to fix broken houses are consistently hampered. Grassroots projects have tried to improvise, to distribute plastic sheeting, yet they are still constrained by restrictions on imports. The failure is political and humanitarian. Answers are available, but are withheld.

A Symbolic Season

The aspect that renders this pain especially painful is how unnecessary it should be. No one should have to study, raise children, or battle sickness standing ankle-deep in cold water inside a tent. No student should fear the rain destroying their final textbook. Rain lays bare just how vulnerable survival is. It tests bodies worn down by pressure, weariness, and sorrow.

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