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The clock read approximately 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I made my way home in Gaza City. Gusts of wind blew, making it impossible to remain any longer, so I had to walk. In the beginning, it was just a gentle sprinkle, but a short distance later the rain became a downpour. It came as no shock. I took shelter by a tent, clapping my hands to draw some warmth. A young boy had positioned himself selling sweet treats. We spoke briefly as I waited, although he appeared disengaged. I observed the cookies were hastily covered in plastic, dampened from the drizzle, and I questioned if he’d have enough to sell before the night ended. The cold seeped into everything.

A Journey Through a City of Tents

As I walked along al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, makeshift shelters crowded both sides of the road. There were no voices from inside them, just the noise of rain pouring down and the moan of the wind. Quickening my pace, trying to dodge the rain, I turned on my mobile phone's torch to illuminate the path. My thoughts kept returning to those taking refuge within: What occupies them now? What is their state of mind? What are they experiencing? It was bitterly cold. I pictured children huddled under soaked bedding, parents moving restlessly to keep them warm.

When I opened the door to my apartment, the freezing handle served as a subtle yet haunting reminder of the suffering faced across Gaza in these severe cold season. I walked into my apartment and felt consumed by the guilt of having a roof when a multitude remained unprotected to the storm.

The Night Escalates

In the middle of the night, the storm grew stronger. Outside, tarps on broken panes billowed and tore, while metal sheets ripped free and crashed to the ground. Overriding the noise came the desperate, terrified shouts of children, piercing the darkness. I felt totally incapable.

Over the past two weeks, the rain has been unending. Cold, heavy, and driven by strong winds, it has flooded makeshift homes, inundated temporary settlements and turned open ground into mud. Elsewhere, this might be called “bad weather”. In Gaza, it is lived with exposure and abandonment.

Al-Arba’iniya

Palestinians know this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the fourty most severe days of winter, starting from late December and persisting to the end of January. It is the true beginning of winter, the moment when the season unleashes its intensity. Normally, it is weathered through preparation and shelter. This year, 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 no longer abstract. In the early hours of Sunday before Christmas, civil defense teams retrieved the remains of two children after the roof of a war-damaged building collapsed in northern Gaza, rescuing five others, including a child and two women. Two people have not been found. These structural failures are not caused by ongoing hostilities, but the outcome of homes weakened by months of bombardment and finally undone by winter rain. In recent days, a young child in Khan Younis succumbed to exposure to the cold.

Precarious Existence

Passing by the camp nearest my home, I observed the results up close. Flimsy tarpaulins sagged under the weight of water, mattresses bobbed in water and clothes were perpetually moist, always damp. Each step reminded me how precarious these dwellings are and how close the rain and cold came to claiming life and health for hundreds of thousands living in tents and overcrowded shelters.

The majority of these individuals have already been forced from their homes, many repeatedly. Homes are lost. Neighbourhoods razed. Winter has arrived in Gaza, but protection from it has not. It has come devoid of safe refuge, without electricity, without heating.

The Weight on Education

In my role as a professor 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 attend online classes from tents; others from overcrowded shelters where personal space doesn't exist and connectivity sporadic. Many of my students have already experienced bereavement. Most have seen their houses destroyed. 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—tasks, schedules—turn into questions of conscience, influenced daily by uncertainty about students’ well-being, comfort and ability to find refuge.

On evenings such as this, I cannot help but wonder about them. Do they have dryness? Is there heat? Could the storm have shredded through their shelter while they were trying to sleep? For those still living in apartments, or damaged structures, there is no heating. With electricity scarce and fuel in short supply, warmth comes mostly via wearing multiple layers and using whatever blankets are left. Despite this, cold nights are unbearable. What about those living in tents?

The Humanitarian Shortfall

Agencies state that over a million people in Gaza exist in makeshift accommodations. Humanitarian assistance, including thermal blankets, have been far from enough. Amid the last tempest, relief groups reported delivering tarpaulins, tents and bedding to a multitude of people. On the ground, however, this assistance was frequently felt to be patchy and insufficient, limited to band-aid measures that offered scant protection against extended hardship to cold, wind and rain. Structures give way. Sicknesses, hypothermia, and infections caused by damp conditions are increasing.

This is not an surprise calamity. Winter is an annual event. People in Gaza understand this failure not as fate, but as neglect. People speak of how critical supplies are blocked or slowed, while attempts to repair damaged homes are frequently blocked. Community efforts 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. Remedies are known, but are kept out.

A Preventable Suffering

The factor that intensifies this hardship especially painful is how avoidable it could have been. It is unconscionable to study, raise children, or combat disease standing surrounded by cold water inside a tent. No learner should dread the rain ruining their last notebook. Rain lays bare just how precarious existence is. It challenges health worn down by anxiety, fatigue, and loss.

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