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The clock read about 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I made my way home in Gaza City. A strong wind was blowing, forcing me inside any longer, so I had to walk. Initially, it was merely a soft rain, but a short distance later the rain suddenly grew heavier. That wasn’t surprising. I stopped near a tent, trying to warm my hands to fight off the chill. A young boy had positioned himself selling baked goods. We shared brief remarks during my pause, but his attention was elsewhere. I observed the cookies were hastily covered in plastic, moist from the drizzle, and I pondered if he’d find buyers before the night ended. A deep chill permeated the air.

A Journey Through a Landscape of Tents

As I walked along al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, tents lined both sides of the road. An eerie silence replaced voices from inside them, only the sound of rain pouring down and the moan of the wind. As I hurried on, trying to dodge the rain, I activated my mobile phone's torch to illuminate the path. I couldn't stop thinking to those taking refuge within: What are they doing now? What thoughts fill their minds? How do they feel? It was bitterly cold. I pictured children nestled under damp covers, parents moving restlessly to keep them warm.

As I unlocked the door to my apartment, the icy doorknob served as a quiet but powerful reminder of the hardships endured across Gaza in these brutal winter climate. I stepped inside my apartment and couldn't shake the guilt of enjoying a dry home when so many were exposed to the storm.

The Night Escalates

During the darkest hours, the storm reached its peak. Outside, makeshift covers on shattered windows billowed and tore, while corrugated metal broke away and fell with a clatter. Above it all came the desperate, terrified shouts of children, piercing the darkness. I felt completely helpless.

For the last fortnight, the rain has been incessant. Chilly, dense, and propelled by strong winds, it has soaked tents, flooded makeshift camps and turned the soil into mud. In different contexts, 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, beginning 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. Ordinarily, it is endured with preparation and shelter. Now, Gaza has none of these. The frost seeps through homes, streets are vacant and people simply endure.

But the danger of winter is far from theoretical. Early on the Sunday before Christmas, civil defense teams retrieved the remains of two children after the roof of a shelled home collapsed in northern Gaza, freeing five additional individuals, including a child and two women. Two people have not been found. These incidents are not caused by ongoing hostilities, but the consequence of homes weakened by months of bombardment and succumbing to winter rain. In recent days, an eight-month-old baby girl in Khan Younis passed away from exposure to the cold.

Precarious Existence

Passing by the camp nearest my home, I saw the consequences up close. Flimsy tarpaulins buckled beneath the weight of water, mattresses were adrift and clothes remained wet, incapable of drying. Each step reinforced how vulnerable these tents are and how close the rain and cold came to claiming life and health for hundreds of thousands living in tents and packed sanctuaries.

A great number of these residents have already been displaced, many repeatedly. Homes are gone. Neighbourhoods leveled. Winter has descended upon Gaza, but protection from it has not. It has come without proper shelter, in darkness, 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 deeply weary. Most attend online classes from tents; others from packed rooms where solitude is unattainable and connectivity intermittent. Many of my students have already experienced bereavement. Most have lost their homes. Yet they continue their education. Their resilience is extraordinary, but it should not be required in this way.

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

On evenings such as this, I find myself thinking about them. Is their shelter holding? Are they warm? Did the wind tear through their shelter during the night? For those remaining in apartments, or what remains of them, there is no heating. With electricity scarce and fuel scarce, warmth comes mostly via bundling up and using any remaining covers. Even so, cold nights are unbearable. What, then those living in tents?

The Humanitarian Shortfall

Agencies state that more than a million people in Gaza exist in makeshift accommodations. Relief items, including insulated tents, have been inadequate. Amid the last tempest, humanitarian partners reported providing tarpaulins, tents and bedding to a multitude of people. For those affected, however, this assistance was frequently felt to be patchy and insufficient, limited to short-term fixes that were largely ineffective against extended hardship to cold, wind and rain. Structures give way. Chest infections, hypothermia, and infections linked to damp conditions are rising.

This goes beyond an surprise calamity. Winter is an annual event. People in Gaza interpret this shortcoming not as misfortune, but as neglect. People speak of how necessary items are restricted or delayed, while attempts to reinforce weakened structures are consistently hampered. Grassroots projects have tried to make do, to provide coverings, yet they are still constrained by what is allowed to enter. The culpability lies in political and humanitarian. Answers are available, but are withheld.

An Unnecessary Pain

The factor that intensifies this hardship especially agonizing is how unnecessary it should be. No one should have to study, raise children, or fight illness 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 challenges health worn down by anxiety, fatigue, and loss.

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