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It was around 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I made my way home in Gaza City. Gusts of wind blew, and I couldn’t stay out any longer, so I had to walk. In the beginning, it was only a light drizzle, but after about 200 metres the rain suddenly grew heavier. That wasn’t surprising. I paused beside a tent, rubbing my palms together to draw some warmth. A young boy was sitting outside selling sweet treats. We shared brief remarks as I waited, but his attention was elsewhere. I saw the cookies were loosely wrapped in plastic, dampened from the drizzle, and I wondered if he’d find buyers before the night ended. A deep chill permeated the air.

A Trek Through a Place of Tents

As I walked along al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, tents lined both sides of the road. There were no voices from inside them, merely the din of torrential rain and the roar of the wind. As I hurried on, seeking escape from the rain, I activated my mobile phone's torch to illuminate the path. I couldn't stop thinking to those huddled within: What occupies them now? What thoughts fill their minds? What emotions do they hold? A severe chill gripped the air. I pictured children huddled under damp covers, parents moving restlessly to keep them warm.

As I unlocked the door to my apartment, the cold metal served as a quiet but powerful reminder of the suffering faced across Gaza in these severe cold season. I entered my apartment and was overwhelmed by the guilt of enjoying a dry home when so many were exposed to the storm.

The Night Intensifies

In the middle of the night, the storm intensified. Outside, makeshift covers on shattered windows sagged and flapped violently, while tin roofing tore loose and slammed down. Above it all came the sharp, panicked screams of children, piercing the darkness. I felt completely helpless.

During recent days, the rain has been relentless. Freezing, pouring, and carried by strong winds, it has soaked tents, inundated temporary settlements and turned bare earth into mud. Elsewhere, this might be called “poor conditions”. In Gaza, it is lived with exposure and abandonment.

The Cruelest Season

Palestinians know this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the fourty most severe days of winter, starting from late December and continuing through the end of January. It is the true beginning of winter, the moment when the season shows its true power. Normally, it is endured with preparation and shelter. This year, Gaza has none of these. The cold bites through homes, streets are vacant and people merely survive.

But the threat posed by the cold is far from theoretical. In the early hours of Sunday before Christmas, rescue operations recovered the bodies of two children after the roof of a shelled home collapsed in northern Gaza, freeing five additional individuals, including a child and two women. Two people remain missing. These structural failures are not new attacks, but the consequence of homes compromised after months of bombardment and ultimately defeated by 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. Flimsy tarpaulins buckled beneath the weight of water, mattresses bobbed in water and clothes remained wet, incapable of drying. 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 packed sanctuaries.

The majority of these individuals have already been displaced, many several times over. Homes are destroyed. Neighbourhoods flattened. Winter has arrived in Gaza, but defense against it has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, without electricity, lacking heat.

A Teacher's Anguish

Being an educator in Gaza, this weather is a heavy burden. My students are not distant names; they are faces I recognize; 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 lost family members. Most have lost their homes. Yet they continue their education. Their fortitude is remarkable, but it should not be required in this way.

In Gaza, what would typically constitute routine academic practices—projects, due dates—transform into moral negotiations, shaped each day by anxiety over students’ security, heat and access to shelter.

On evenings such as this, I find myself thinking about them. Do they have dryness? Is there heat? Did the wind tear through their shelter as they attempted to rest? For those remaining in apartments, or damaged structures, there is an absence of warmth. With electricity mostly absent and fuel rare, warmth comes mostly via wearing multiple layers and using the few bedding items available. Despite this, cold nights are unbearable. How then those living in tents?

The Humanitarian Shortfall

Figures show that more than a million people in Gaza live in shelters. Aid supplies, including thermal blankets, have been inadequate. During the recent storm, relief groups reported providing coverings, shelters and sleeping materials to a multitude of people. In reality, however, this assistance was often perceived as patchy and insufficient, limited to short-term fixes that offered scant protection against extended hardship to cold, wind and rain. Tents collapse. Respiratory illnesses, hypothermia, and infections associated with damp conditions are on the upswing.

This cannot be described as an unexpected catastrophe. Winter arrives cyclically. People in Gaza understand this failure not as misfortune, but as being forsaken. People speak of how critical supplies are blocked or slowed, while attempts to repair damaged homes are consistently hampered. Community efforts have tried to find solutions, to hand out tarps, yet they continue to be hampered by bureaucratic barriers. The failure is political and humanitarian. Answers are available, but are prevented from arriving.

An Unnecessary Pain

The aspect that renders this pain especially agonizing is how preventable it is. No one should have to study, raise children, or combat disease standing ankle-deep in cold water inside a tent. It is wrong for a pupil to worry about the rain destroying their final textbook. Rain exposes just how precarious existence is. It challenges health worn down by stress, exhaustion, and grief.

This winter coincides with the Christmas season that, for millions, epitomizes warmth, refuge and care for the disadvantaged. In Palestine, that {symbolism