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It was approximately 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I headed back home in Gaza City. A strong wind was blowing, and I couldn’t stay out any longer, so I had to walk. At first, it was just a gentle sprinkle, 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 draw some warmth. A young boy sat nearby selling sweet treats. We shared brief remarks as I waited, although he appeared disengaged. I observed the cookies were poorly packaged in plastic, dampened from the drizzle, and I wondered if he’d manage to sell them all before the night ended. The cold seeped into everything.

A Walk Through a Place 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. Rushing forward, attempting to avoid the rain, I activated my mobile phone's torch to light my way. My thoughts kept returning to those sheltering inside: What are they doing now? What is their state of mind? What are they experiencing? It was bitterly cold. I envisioned children nestled under wet blankets, parents shifting constantly to keep them warm.

When I opened the door to my apartment, the freezing handle served as a understated yet stark reminder of the suffering faced across Gaza in these harsh winter conditions. I walked into my apartment and was overwhelmed by the guilt of having a roof when countless others faced exposure to the storm.

The Darkness Intensifies

During the darkest hours, the storm reached its peak. Outside, plastic sheeting on damaged glass sagged and flapped violently, while tin roofing ripped free and slammed down. Above it all came the desperate, terrified shouts of children, piercing the darkness. I felt utterly powerless.

For the last fortnight, the rain has been incessant. Freezing, pouring, and carried by strong winds, it has soaked tents, swamped refugee areas and turned bare earth into mud. In different contexts, this might be called “inclement weather”. In Gaza, it is experienced amidst exposure and abandonment.

The Cruelest Season

Palestinians know this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the most bitter forty 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 faced with preparation and shelter. Currently, Gaza has none of these. The frost seeps through homes, streets are deserted and people merely survive.

But the peril of the season is no longer abstract. Early on the Sunday before Christmas, rescue operations recovered the bodies 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 have not been found. These structural failures are not caused by ongoing hostilities, but the consequence of homes damaged from months of bombardment and ultimately defeated by winter rain. Earlier this month, an infant in Khan Younis died of exposure to the cold.

Precarious Existence

Passing by the camp nearest my home, I observed the results up close. Flimsy tarpaulins strained under the weight of water, mattresses floated and clothes hung damply, incapable of drying. Each step highlighted how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold threatened life and health for hundreds of thousands living in tents and cramped refuges.

A great number of these residents have already been forced from their homes, many repeatedly. Homes are destroyed. Neighbourhoods flattened. Winter has descended upon Gaza, but shelter from its fury has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, without electricity, 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; smart, persistent, but profoundly exhausted. Most attend online classes from tents; others from packed rooms where privacy is impossible and connectivity unreliable. Many of my students have already suffered personal loss. Most have been rendered homeless. Yet they continue their education. Their resilience is extraordinary, but it ought not be necessary in this way.

In Gaza, what would normally count as routine academic practices—tasks, schedules—turn into ethical dilemmas, shaped each day by concern for students’ security, heat and proximity to protection.

When the storm rages, I am constantly preoccupied about them. Do they have dryness? Are they warm? Did the wind tear through their shelter during the night? For those residing in apartments, or damaged structures, there is a lack of heat. With electricity largely unavailable and fuel in short supply, warmth comes mostly via wearing multiple layers and using any remaining covers. Despite this, cold nights are excruciating. What, then those living in tents?

Aid and Abandonment

Reports indicate that over a million people in Gaza live in shelters. Humanitarian assistance, including thermal blankets, have been far from enough. During the recent storm, relief groups reported providing plastic sheets, tents and mattresses to thousands of families. In reality, however, this assistance was frequently felt to be patchy and insufficient, limited to band-aid measures that were largely ineffective against ongoing suffering to cold, wind and rain. Shelters fail. Respiratory illnesses, hypothermia, and infections associated with damp conditions are rising.

This is not an unforeseen disaster. Winter is an annual event. People in Gaza view this crisis not as misfortune, but as neglect. People speak of how necessary items are hindered or postponed, while attempts to repair damaged homes are frequently blocked. Grassroots projects have tried to improvise, to distribute plastic sheeting, yet they continue to be hampered by bureaucratic barriers. The failure is political and humanitarian. Solutions exist, but are withheld.

A Preventable Suffering

What makes this suffering especially agonizing is how unnecessary it should be. No one should have to study, raise children, or combat disease standing knee-high in cold water inside a tent. It is wrong for a pupil to worry about the rain damaging their precious phone. Rain reveals just how fragile life has become. It tests bodies worn down by anxiety, fatigue, and loss.

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