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The clock read approximately 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I made my way home in Gaza City. Gusts of wind blew, forcing me inside any longer, so walking was my only option. At first, it was only a light drizzle, but a short distance later the rain intensified abruptly. It came as no shock. I paused beside a tent, rubbing my palms together to generate a little heat. A young boy sat nearby selling baked goods. We exchanged a few words while I stood there, though he didn’t seem interested. I saw the cookies were poorly packaged in plastic, moist from the drizzle, and I wondered if he’d have enough to sell before the night ended. The freezing temperature invaded every space.

A Journey Through a City of Tents

While traversing al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, canvas structures flanked both sides of the road. There were no voices from inside them, just the noise of rain pouring down and the whistle of the wind. As I hurried on, attempting to avoid the rain, I switched on my mobile phone's torch to light my way. My thoughts kept returning to those sheltering inside: How are they passing the time now? What is their state of mind? What are they experiencing? A severe chill gripped the air. I pictured children curled under wet blankets, parents adjusting repeatedly to keep them warm.

When I opened the door to my apartment, the icy doorknob served as a subtle yet haunting reminder of the struggles borne across Gaza in these severe cold season. I walked into my apartment and couldn't shake the guilt of possessing shelter when countless others faced exposure to the storm.

The Night Worsens

In the middle of the night, the storm grew stronger. Outside, tarps on shattered windows sagged and flapped violently, while tin roofing broke away and crashed to the ground. Cutting through the chaos came the desperate, terrified shouts of children, shattering the darkness. I felt totally incapable.

Over the past two weeks, the rain has been incessant. Freezing, pouring, and carried by strong winds, it has flooded makeshift homes, swamped refugee areas and turned the soil into mud. In other places, this might be called “bad weather”. In Gaza, it is lived with exposure and abandonment.

The Harshest Days

Palestinians know this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the most bitter forty days of winter, starting from late December and continuing through the end of January. It is the definite start of winter, the moment when the season unleashes its intensity. Typically, it is endured with preparation and shelter. Currently, Gaza has no such defenses. The frost seeps through homes, streets are deserted and people merely survive.

But the danger of winter is now very real. Early on the Sunday before Christmas, civil defense teams found the victims of two children after the roof of a bombarded structure collapsed in northern Gaza, rescuing five others, including a child and two women. Two people remain missing. These incidents are not new attacks, but the result of homes compromised after months of bombardment and ultimately defeated by winter rain. In recent days, a young child in Khan Younis succumbed to exposure to the cold.

Fragile Shelters

Observing the camp nearest my home, I witnessed the impact up close. Thin plastic sheets buckled beneath the weight of water, mattresses floated and clothes hung damply, never fully drying. Each step reminded me how precarious these dwellings are and how close the rain and cold threatened life and health for hundreds of thousands living in tents and cramped refuges.

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 shelter from its fury has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, with no power, without heating.

The Weight on Education

As a university lecturer in Gaza, this weather is a heavy burden. My students are not distant names; they are faces I recognize; bright, resilient, but deeply weary. Most attend online classes from tents; others from overcrowded shelters where personal space doesn't exist and connectivity unreliable. Countless learners have already lost family members. Most have lost their homes. Yet they still try to study. Their resilience is extraordinary, but it must not be demanded in this way.

In Gaza, what would normally count as routine academic practices—assignments, deadlines—become moral negotiations, dictated every moment by anxiety over students’ security, heat and access to shelter.

When the storm rages, I find myself thinking about them. Is their shelter holding? Do they feel any warmth? Could the storm have shredded through their shelter during the night? For those remaining in apartments, or the shells that are left, there is a lack of heat. With electricity largely unavailable and fuel rare, warmth comes primarily through bundling up and using whatever blankets are left. Despite this, cold nights are intolerable. What, then those living in tents?

Aid and Abandonment

Reports indicate that well over a million people in Gaza live in shelters. Relief items, including weatherproof shelters, have been far from enough. Amid the last tempest, aid organizations reported providing tarpaulins, tents and bedding to thousands of families. On the ground, however, this assistance was frequently felt to be uneven and inadequate, limited to band-aid measures that offered scant protection against prolonged exposure to cold, wind and rain. Structures give way. Respiratory illnesses, hypothermia, and infections linked to damp conditions are rising.

This cannot be described as an unforeseen disaster. Winter comes every year. People in Gaza understand this failure not as bad luck, but as being forsaken. People speak of how essential materials are blocked or slowed, while attempts to fix broken houses are consistently hampered. Local initiatives have tried to improvise, to distribute plastic sheeting, yet they are still constrained by what is allowed to enter. The culpability lies in political and humanitarian. Answers are available, but are kept out.

A Symbolic Season

What makes this suffering especially painful is how avoidable it could have been. No one should have 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 exposes just how vulnerable survival is. It challenges health worn down by pressure, weariness, and sorrow.

This year's chill coincides with the Christmas season that, for millions, epitomizes warmth, refuge and care for the most vulnerable. In Palestine, that {symbolism