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The clock read around 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I returned home in Gaza City. Gusts of wind blew, and I couldn’t stay out any longer, so I had to walk. At first, it was merely a soft rain, but a short distance later the rain suddenly grew heavier. This was expected. I took shelter by a tent, trying to warm my hands to fight off the chill. A young boy was sitting outside selling sweet treats. We exchanged a few words during my pause, although he appeared disengaged. I observed the cookies were loosely wrapped in plastic, moist from the drizzle, and I wondered if he’d have enough to sell before the night ended. A deep chill permeated the air.

A Trek Through a Place of Tents

While traversing al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, tents lined both sides of the road. No sounds of conversation came from inside them, just the noise of torrential rain and the moan of the wind. Rushing forward, 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: How are they passing the time now? What thoughts fill their minds? How do they feel? The cold was piercing. I imagined children curled under damp covers, parents shifting constantly to keep them warm.

Upon opening the door to my apartment, the icy doorknob served as a understated yet stark reminder of the hardships endured across Gaza in these severe cold season. I entered my apartment and felt consumed by the guilt of possessing shelter when countless others faced exposure to the storm.

The Night Intensifies

As midnight passed, the storm reached its peak. Outside, plastic sheeting on broken panes billowed and tore, while metal sheets broke away and crashed to the ground. Above it all came the desperate, terrified shouts of children, shattering the darkness. I felt totally incapable.

For the last fortnight, the rain has been incessant. Cold, heavy, and driven by strong winds, it has soaked tents, swamped refugee areas and turned the soil into mud. In other places, this might be called “poor conditions”. In Gaza, it is experienced amidst exposure and abandonment.

Al-Arba’iniya

Palestinians know this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the fourty most severe days of winter, commencing in late December and persisting to the end of January. It is the true beginning of winter, the moment when the season unleashes its intensity. Typically, it is faced with preparation and shelter. Currently, Gaza has no such defenses. The cold bites through homes, streets are vacant and people simply endure.

But the threat posed by the cold is now very real. On the Sunday morning before Christmas, rescue operations retrieved the remains 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 caused by ongoing hostilities, but the result of homes damaged from months of bombardment and succumbing to winter rain. In recent days, an eight-month-old baby girl in Khan Younis succumbed to exposure to the cold.

A Life in Tents

Observing the camp nearest my home, I observed the results up close. Inadequate coverings buckled beneath the weight of water, mattresses bobbed in water and clothes were perpetually moist, incapable of drying. Each step reinforced how fragile these shelters were 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 on multiple occasions. Homes are gone. Neighbourhoods flattened. Winter has come to Gaza, but defense against it has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, without electricity, devoid of warmth.

A Teacher's Anguish

Being an educator in Gaza, this weather causes deep concern. My students are not figures in a report; they are young people I speak to; intelligent, determined, but profoundly exhausted. Most join virtual lessons from tents; others from overcrowded shelters where privacy is impossible and connectivity sporadic. A significant number of pupils have already suffered personal loss. Most have lost their homes. Yet they continue their education. Their resilience is extraordinary, but it ought not be necessary in this way.

In Gaza, what would usually be routine academic practices—tasks, schedules—turn into ethical dilemmas, shaped each day by uncertainty about students’ safety, warmth and access to shelter.

When the storm rages, I cannot help but wonder about them. Are they dry? Do they feel any warmth? Did the wind tear through their shelter while they were trying to sleep? For those still living in apartments, or the shells that are left, there is a lack of heat. With electricity mostly absent and fuel scarce, warmth comes mostly via bundling up and using whatever blankets are left. Despite this, cold nights are unbearable. What, then those living in tents?

Aid and Abandonment

Agencies state that well over a million people in Gaza exist in makeshift accommodations. Humanitarian assistance, including thermal blankets, have been inadequate. Amid the last tempest, humanitarian partners reported providing plastic sheets, tents and mattresses to thousands of families. On the ground, however, this assistance was often perceived as inconsistent and lacking, limited to band-aid measures that did little against prolonged exposure to cold, wind and rain. Tents collapse. Respiratory illnesses, hypothermia, and infections caused by damp conditions are on the upswing.

This cannot be described as an unexpected catastrophe. Winter is an annual event. People in Gaza understand this failure not as misfortune, but as abandonment. People speak of how essential materials are restricted or delayed, while attempts to repair damaged homes are repeatedly obstructed. Grassroots projects have tried to make do, to hand out tarps, yet they are still constrained by restrictions on imports. The culpability lies in political and humanitarian. Answers are available, but are prevented from arriving.

A Preventable Suffering

What makes this suffering especially painful is how avoidable it could have been. It is unconscionable to study, raise children, or battle sickness standing ankle-deep in cold water inside a tent. No student should fear the rain ruining their last notebook. Rain exposes just how vulnerable survival is. It challenges health worn down by anxiety, fatigue, and loss.

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