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It was around 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I returned home in Gaza City. A strong wind was blowing, forcing me inside any longer, so walking was my only option. At first, it was merely a soft rain, but after about 200 metres the rain became a downpour. This was expected. I took shelter by a tent, rubbing my palms together to draw some warmth. A young boy had positioned himself selling homemade cookies. We exchanged a few words as I waited, although he appeared disengaged. I noticed the cookies were hastily covered in plastic, already soggy from the drizzle, and I questioned if he’d find buyers before the night ended. A deep chill permeated the air.

A Walk Through a City of Tents

As I walked along al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, tents lined both sides of the road. There were no voices from inside them, only the sound of torrential rain and the roar of the wind. Quickening my pace, attempting to avoid the rain, I switched on my mobile phone's torch to light my way. My thoughts kept returning to those sheltering inside: What occupies them now? What is their state of mind? How do they feel? A severe chill gripped the air. I pictured children huddled under damp covers, parents shifting constantly to keep them warm.

When I opened the door to my apartment, the cold metal served as a subtle yet haunting reminder of the suffering faced across Gaza in these severe cold season. I walked into my apartment and couldn't shake the guilt of having a roof when so many were exposed to the storm.

The Darkness Worsens

During the darkest hours, the storm reached its peak. Outside, plastic sheeting on broken panes billowed and tore, while corrugated metal ripped free and fell with a clatter. Overriding the noise came the sharp, panicked screams of children, piercing the darkness. I felt utterly powerless.

During recent days, the rain has been incessant. Freezing, pouring, and carried by strong winds, it has flooded makeshift homes, inundated temporary settlements and turned open ground into mud. Elsewhere, this might be called “poor conditions”. In Gaza, it is lived with exposure and abandonment.

Al-Arba’iniya

Residents refer to this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the 40 coldest and harshest days of winter, commencing in late December and continuing through 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. This year, Gaza has none of these. The chill penetrates through homes, streets are empty and people just persevere.

But the danger of winter is far from theoretical. On the Sunday morning before Christmas, civil defense teams found the victims 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 are still unaccounted for. These structural failures are not new attacks, but the result of homes compromised after months of bombardment and ultimately defeated by winter rain. Earlier this month, an eight-month-old baby girl in Khan Younis died of exposure to the cold.

A Life in Tents

Passing by the camp nearest my home, I witnessed the impact up close. Inadequate coverings sagged under the weight of water, mattresses bobbed in water and clothes hung damply, never fully drying. Each step reminded me how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold threatened life and health for hundreds of thousands living in tents and cramped refuges.

The majority of these individuals have already been uprooted, many several times over. Homes are lost. Neighbourhoods razed. Winter has come to Gaza, but defense against it has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, in darkness, devoid of warmth.

Students in the Storm

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; intelligent, determined, but profoundly exhausted. Most attend online classes from tents; others from cramped quarters where solitude is unattainable and connectivity intermittent. A significant number of pupils have already lost family members. Most have lost their homes. Yet they continue their education. Their fortitude is remarkable, but it ought not be necessary in this way.

In Gaza, what would usually be routine academic practices—tasks, schedules—become moral negotiations, influenced daily by uncertainty about students’ safety, warmth and proximity to protection.

When the storm rages, I am constantly preoccupied about them. Are they dry? Are they warm? Could the storm have shredded through their shelter while they were trying to sleep? For those residing in apartments, or what remains of them, there is a lack of heat. With electricity scarce and fuel scarce, warmth comes mainly from donning extra clothing and using the few bedding items available. Even so, cold nights are intolerable. What about those living in tents?

Political Failure

Figures show that more than a million people in Gaza exist in makeshift accommodations. Aid supplies, including insulated tents, have been far from enough. During the recent storm, relief groups reported providing tarpaulins, tents and bedding to a multitude of people. For those affected, however, this assistance was widely experienced as uneven and inadequate, limited to band-aid measures that did little against ongoing suffering to cold, wind and rain. Shelters fail. Chest infections, hypothermia, and infections associated with damp conditions are on the upswing.

This is not an surprise calamity. Winter arrives cyclically. People in Gaza understand this failure not as bad luck, but as being forsaken. People speak of how necessary items are blocked or slowed, while attempts to repair damaged homes are consistently hampered. Local initiatives have tried to find solutions, to hand out tarps, yet they remain limited by bureaucratic barriers. The root cause is political and humanitarian. Solutions exist, but are prevented from arriving.

A Preventable Suffering

What makes this suffering especially painful is how unnecessary it should be. No individual ought to study, raise children, or battle sickness standing ankle-deep in cold water inside a tent. No learner should dread the rain ruining their last notebook. Rain exposes just how precarious existence is. It strains physiques worn down by pressure, weariness, and sorrow.

This year's chill aligns with the Christmas season that, for millions, epitomizes warmth, refuge and care for the disadvantaged. In Palestine, that {symbolism