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The time was around 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I headed back 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 merely a soft rain, but after about 200 metres the rain became a downpour. That wasn’t surprising. I paused beside a tent, trying to warm my hands to fight off the chill. A young boy sat nearby selling baked goods. We exchanged a few words during my pause, although he appeared disengaged. 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. A deep chill permeated the air.

A Journey Through a Landscape of Tents

While traversing 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 torrential rain and the whistle of the wind. As I hurried on, attempting to avoid the rain, I activated my mobile phone's torch to light my way. My mind continually drifted to those taking refuge within: How are they passing the time now? What thoughts fill their minds? How do they feel? It was bitterly cold. I imagined children huddled under soaked bedding, 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 struggles borne across Gaza in these severe cold season. I walked into my apartment and was overwhelmed by the guilt of possessing shelter when a multitude remained unprotected to the storm.

The Darkness Worsens

During the darkest hours, the storm intensified. Outside, makeshift covers on damaged glass sagged and flapped violently, while tin roofing broke away and crashed to the ground. Overriding the noise came the desperate, terrified shouts of children, shattering the darkness. I felt completely helpless.

During recent days, the rain has been incessant. Chilly, dense, and propelled by strong winds, it has drenched shelters, swamped refugee areas and turned open ground into mud. In different contexts, this might be called “inclement weather”. In Gaza, it is endured in a state of exposure and abandonment.

The Cruelest Season

Locals call 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 real onset of winter, the moment when the season reveals its full force. Typically, it is weathered through preparation and shelter. This year, Gaza has neither. The chill penetrates through homes, streets are empty and people merely survive.

But the danger of winter is no longer abstract. In the early hours of Sunday before Christmas, rescue operations 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 are still unaccounted for. These incidents are not new attacks, but the outcome of homes weakened by 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.

Fragile Shelters

Passing by the camp nearest my home, I witnessed the impact up close. Inadequate coverings strained under the weight of water, mattresses bobbed in water and clothes hung damply, never fully drying. Each step highlighted how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold threatened life and health for a vast population living in tents and overcrowded shelters.

A great number of these residents have already been uprooted, many repeatedly. Homes are lost. Neighbourhoods flattened. Winter has come to Gaza, but defense against it has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, with no power, devoid of warmth.

Students in the Storm

In my role as a professor in Gaza, this weather is a heavy burden. My students are not mere statistics; they are young people I speak to; smart, persistent, but extremely fatigued. Most join virtual lessons from tents; others from cramped quarters where solitude is unattainable and connectivity sporadic. Countless learners have already experienced bereavement. Most have seen their houses destroyed. Yet they still try to study. Their resilience is extraordinary, but it should not be required in this way.

In Gaza, what would normally count as routine academic practices—assignments, deadlines—turn into questions of conscience, shaped each day by uncertainty about students’ well-being, comfort and ability to find refuge.

During nights like these, I am constantly preoccupied about them. Are they dry? Are they warm? Has the gale ripped through their shelter as they attempted to rest? For those still living in apartments, or the shells that are left, there is a lack of heat. With electricity largely unavailable and fuel scarce, warmth comes mainly from wearing multiple layers and using any remaining covers. Even so, cold nights are unbearable. What about those living in tents?

Aid and Abandonment

Reports indicate that more than a million people in Gaza reside in temporary housing. Aid supplies, including thermal blankets, have been far from enough. Amid the last tempest, relief groups reported providing plastic sheets, tents and mattresses to numerous households. On the ground, however, this assistance was frequently felt to be uneven and inadequate, limited to short-term fixes that did little against prolonged exposure to cold, wind and rain. Structures give way. Chest infections, hypothermia, and infections linked to damp conditions are on the upswing.

This is not an surprise calamity. Winter is an annual event. People in Gaza view this crisis not as fate, but as being forsaken. People speak of how essential materials are blocked or slowed, while attempts to fix broken houses are frequently blocked. Grassroots projects have tried to find solutions, to hand out tarps, yet they remain limited by bureaucratic barriers. The root cause is political and humanitarian. Remedies are known, but are withheld.

A Symbolic Season

The aspect that renders this pain especially painful is how avoidable it could have been. No individual ought to study, raise children, or combat disease standing ankle-deep in cold water inside a tent. No learner should dread the rain destroying their final textbook. Rain lays bare just how fragile life has become. It tests bodies worn down by anxiety, fatigue, and loss.

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