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It was around 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I returned home in Gaza City. A strong wind was blowing, making it impossible to remain any longer, so I had to walk. Initially, it was merely a soft rain, but a short distance later the rain suddenly grew heavier. It came as no shock. I stopped near a tent, clapping my hands to draw some warmth. A young boy had positioned himself selling baked goods. We exchanged a few words while I stood there, but his attention was elsewhere. I noticed the cookies were loosely wrapped in plastic, dampened from the drizzle, and I wondered if he’d manage to sell them all before the night ended. The freezing temperature invaded every space.

A Walk 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, merely the din of falling water and the moan of the wind. Rushing forward, trying to dodge the rain, I turned on my mobile phone's torch to illuminate the path. I couldn't stop thinking to those sheltering inside: What occupies them now? What are they thinking? What are they experiencing? A severe chill gripped the air. I envisioned children huddled under wet blankets, parents adjusting repeatedly to keep them warm.

Upon opening the door to my apartment, the freezing handle served as a quiet but powerful reminder of the suffering faced across Gaza in these brutal winter climate. I walked into my apartment and was overwhelmed by the guilt of enjoying a dry home when a multitude remained unprotected to the storm.

The Night Escalates

In the middle of the night, the storm reached its peak. Outside, tarps on broken panes sagged and flapped violently, while corrugated metal broke away and fell with a clatter. Overriding the noise came the sharp, panicked screams of children, piercing the darkness. I felt totally incapable.

For the last fortnight, the rain has been relentless. Cold, heavy, and driven by strong winds, it has flooded makeshift homes, flooded makeshift camps and turned bare earth into mud. In different contexts, this might be called “inclement weather”. In Gaza, it is lived with exposure and abandonment.

Al-Arba’iniya

Locals call this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the most bitter forty days of winter, commencing in late December and continuing through the end of January. It is the true beginning of winter, the moment when the season unleashes its intensity. Ordinarily, it is faced with preparation and shelter. This year, Gaza has neither. The cold bites through homes, streets are empty and people merely survive.

But the threat posed by the cold is far from theoretical. On the Sunday morning before Christmas, civil defense teams retrieved the remains of two children after the roof of a shelled home collapsed in northern Gaza, saving five more people, including a child and two women. Two people have not been found. Such collapses are not caused by ongoing hostilities, but the outcome of homes compromised after months of bombardment and ultimately defeated by winter rain. Not long ago, an infant in Khan Younis died of exposure to the cold.

Fragile Shelters

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 hung damply, incapable of drying. Each step reminded me how vulnerable these tents are and how close the rain and cold threatened life and health for hundreds of thousands living in tents and packed sanctuaries.

The majority of these individuals have already been forced from their homes, many on multiple occasions. Homes are lost. Neighbourhoods flattened. Winter has descended upon Gaza, but protection from it has not. It has come without proper shelter, without electricity, without heating.

The Weight on Education

Being an educator in Gaza, this weather causes deep concern. My students are not mere statistics; they are faces I recognize; smart, persistent, but profoundly exhausted. Most attend online classes from tents; others from cramped quarters where solitude is unattainable and connectivity sporadic. 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—projects, due dates—transform into ethical dilemmas, dictated every moment by uncertainty about students’ safety, warmth and access to shelter.

On evenings such as this, I find myself thinking about them. Do they have dryness? Is there heat? Could the storm have shredded through their shelter during the night? For those remaining in apartments, or what remains of them, there is an absence of warmth. With electricity scarce and fuel in short supply, warmth comes primarily through wearing multiple layers and using the few bedding items available. Nonetheless, cold nights are excruciating. How then those living in tents?

Aid and Abandonment

Agencies state that more than a million people in Gaza exist in makeshift accommodations. Aid supplies, including thermal blankets, have been insufficient. When the cyclone hit, aid organizations reported delivering coverings, shelters and sleeping materials to a multitude of people. For those affected, however, this assistance was often perceived as uneven and inadequate, limited to temporary solutions that were largely ineffective against prolonged exposure to cold, wind and rain. Tents collapse. Chest infections, hypothermia, and infections linked to damp conditions are on the upswing.

This is not an unexpected catastrophe. Winter comes every year. People in Gaza view this crisis not as bad luck, but as abandonment. People speak of how essential materials are blocked or slowed, while attempts to repair damaged homes are consistently hampered. Local initiatives have tried to find solutions, to distribute plastic sheeting, yet they are still constrained by restrictions on imports. The culpability lies in political and humanitarian. Answers are available, but are kept out.

An Unnecessary Pain

What makes this suffering especially painful is how preventable it is. No individual ought to study, raise children, or battle sickness standing knee-high in cold water inside a tent. No student should fear the rain destroying their final textbook. Rain reveals just how vulnerable survival is. It strains physiques worn down by anxiety, fatigue, and loss.

The current cold season coincides with the Christmas season that, for millions, epitomizes warmth, refuge and care for the most vulnerable. In Palestine, that {symbolism