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It was approximately 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I headed back home in Gaza City. The wind howled, 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 suddenly grew heavier. This was expected. I paused beside a tent, rubbing my palms together to generate a little heat. A young boy was sitting outside selling homemade cookies. We shared brief remarks while I stood there, but his attention was elsewhere. I noticed the cookies were hastily covered 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 Walk Through a Landscape of Tents

Walking down al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, makeshift shelters crowded both sides of the road. There were no voices from inside them, only the sound of torrential rain and the roar of the wind. As I hurried on, attempting to avoid the rain, I switched on my mobile phone's torch to light my way. I couldn't stop thinking to those taking refuge within: 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 huddled under soaked bedding, parents adjusting repeatedly to keep them warm.

Upon opening the door to my apartment, the cold metal served as a understated yet stark reminder of the hardships endured across Gaza in these harsh winter conditions. I stepped inside my apartment and couldn't shake the guilt of possessing shelter when so many were exposed to the storm.

The Darkness Intensifies

As midnight passed, the storm reached its peak. Outside, tarps on shattered windows whipped and strained, while tin roofing ripped free and fell with a clatter. Cutting through the chaos came the desperate, terrified shouts of children, piercing the darkness. I felt utterly powerless.

Over the past two weeks, the rain has been unending. Freezing, pouring, and carried by strong winds, it has drenched shelters, inundated temporary settlements and turned open ground into mud. Elsewhere, this might be called “inclement weather”. In Gaza, it is endured in a state of exposure and abandonment.

The Harshest Days

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 real onset of winter, the moment when the season shows its true power. Typically, it is weathered through preparation and shelter. Currently, Gaza has none of these. The cold bites through homes, streets are vacant and people merely survive.

But the peril of the season is far from theoretical. In the early hours of Sunday before Christmas, recovery efforts found the victims 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. Such collapses are not caused by ongoing hostilities, but the result of homes compromised after months of bombardment and succumbing to winter rain. In recent days, 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. Inadequate coverings sagged under 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 came to claiming life and health for a vast population living in tents and cramped refuges.

The majority of these individuals have already been displaced, many repeatedly. Homes are lost. Neighbourhoods razed. Winter has come to Gaza, but shelter from its fury has not. It has come devoid of safe refuge, with no power, without heating.

Students in the Storm

In my role as a professor in Gaza, this weather weighs heavily on me. My students are not mere statistics; they are young people I speak to; smart, persistent, but deeply weary. Most attend online classes from tents; others from packed rooms where personal space doesn't exist and connectivity unreliable. Countless learners have already experienced bereavement. Most have seen their houses destroyed. Yet they continue their education. Their resilience is extraordinary, but it should not be required in this way.

In Gaza, what would usually be routine academic practices—projects, due dates—become questions of conscience, influenced daily by anxiety over students’ well-being, comfort and access to shelter.

During nights like these, I cannot help but wonder about them. Are they dry? Is there heat? 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 scarce and fuel scarce, warmth comes mainly from wearing multiple layers and using the few bedding items available. Even so, cold nights are excruciating. What, then those living in tents?

Aid and Abandonment

Agencies state that over a million people in Gaza reside in temporary housing. Aid supplies, including thermal blankets, have been inadequate. Amid the last tempest, relief groups reported distributing plastic sheets, tents and mattresses to numerous households. For those affected, however, this assistance was widely experienced as inconsistent and lacking, limited to band-aid measures that did little against extended hardship to cold, wind and rain. Tents collapse. Respiratory illnesses, hypothermia, and infections associated with damp conditions are rising.

This goes beyond an unexpected catastrophe. Winter comes every year. People in Gaza understand this failure not as fate, but as abandonment. People speak of how necessary items are restricted or delayed, while attempts to reinforce weakened structures are consistently hampered. Grassroots projects have tried to find solutions, to provide coverings, yet they are still constrained by what is allowed to enter. The root cause is political and humanitarian. Answers are available, but are kept out.

A Preventable Suffering

What makes this suffering especially agonizing is how avoidable it could have been. No one should have to study, raise children, or fight illness standing surrounded by cold water inside a tent. No student should fear the rain ruining their last notebook. Rain lays bare just how vulnerable survival is. It strains physiques worn down by pressure, weariness, and sorrow.

The current cold season occurs alongside the Christmas season that, for millions, symbolises warmth, refuge and care for the disadvantaged. In Palestine, that {symbolism