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It was approximately 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I made my way home in Gaza City. Gusts of wind blew, forcing me inside any longer, so walking was my only option. Initially, it was only a light drizzle, but following a brief walk the rain intensified abruptly. That wasn’t surprising. I stopped near a tent, trying to warm my hands to fight off the chill. A young boy was sitting outside selling baked goods. We spoke briefly during my pause, but his attention was elsewhere. I saw the cookies were hastily covered in plastic, dampened from the drizzle, and I questioned if he’d find buyers before the night ended. A deep chill permeated the air.

A Journey Through a City of Tents

Walking down al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, tents lined both sides of the road. There were no voices from inside them, merely the din of falling water and the whistle of the wind. Rushing forward, trying to dodge the rain, I switched on my mobile phone's torch to light my way. My mind continually drifted to those sheltering inside: What occupies them now? What thoughts fill their minds? What emotions do they hold? A severe chill gripped the air. I envisioned children nestled under damp covers, parents adjusting repeatedly to keep them warm.

When I opened the door to my apartment, the freezing handle served as a understated yet stark reminder of the struggles borne across Gaza in these harsh winter conditions. I walked into my apartment and felt consumed by the guilt of enjoying a dry home when countless others faced exposure to the storm.

The Darkness Worsens

As midnight passed, the storm grew stronger. Outside, tarps on damaged glass whipped and strained, while metal sheets broke away and crashed to the ground. Cutting through the chaos came the desperate, terrified shouts of children, piercing the darkness. I felt totally incapable.

Over the past two weeks, the rain has been incessant. Cold, heavy, and driven by strong winds, it has drenched shelters, swamped refugee areas and turned bare earth into mud. Elsewhere, this might be called “bad weather”. In Gaza, it is experienced amidst exposure and abandonment.

The Cruelest Season

Palestinians know this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the fourty most severe days of winter, commencing in late December and lasting until the end of January. It is the definite start of winter, the moment when the season unleashes its intensity. Typically, it is faced with preparation and shelter. This year, Gaza has no such defenses. The frost seeps through homes, streets are empty and people merely survive.

But the danger of winter is now very real. On the Sunday morning before Christmas, recovery efforts recovered the bodies of two children after the roof of a shelled home collapsed in northern Gaza, rescuing five others, including a child and two women. Two people are still unaccounted for. These incidents are not the result of fresh strikes, but the outcome of homes weakened by months of bombardment and ultimately defeated by winter rain. In recent days, an infant in Khan Younis succumbed to exposure to the cold.

Fragile Shelters

Passing by the camp nearest my home, I saw the consequences up close. Thin plastic sheets buckled beneath the weight of water, mattresses floated and clothes hung damply, incapable of drying. Each step reminded me how precarious these dwellings are and how close the rain and cold came to taking 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 several times over. Homes are destroyed. Neighbourhoods leveled. Winter has arrived in Gaza, but shelter from its fury has not. It has come devoid of safe refuge, in darkness, lacking heat.

Students in the Storm

In my role as a professor in Gaza, this weather is a heavy burden. My students are not distant names; they are young people I speak to; intelligent, determined, but profoundly exhausted. Most participate in digital sessions from tents; others from cramped quarters where solitude is unattainable and connectivity sporadic. Many of my students have already lost family members. Most have lost their homes. Yet they still try to study. Their resilience is extraordinary, but it ought not be necessary 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 proximity to protection.

When the storm rages, I find myself thinking about them. Is their shelter holding? Do they feel any warmth? Did the wind tear through their shelter during the night? For those still living in apartments, or the shells that are left, there is no heating. With electricity scarce and fuel rare, warmth comes mostly via donning extra clothing and using the few bedding items available. Nonetheless, cold nights are excruciating. How then those living in tents?

Aid and Abandonment

Figures show that more than a million people in Gaza live in shelters. Humanitarian assistance, including insulated tents, have been insufficient. When the cyclone hit, humanitarian partners reported providing plastic sheets, tents and mattresses to thousands of families. On the ground, however, this assistance was widely experienced as patchy and insufficient, limited to band-aid measures that were largely ineffective against ongoing suffering to cold, wind and rain. Structures give way. Respiratory illnesses, hypothermia, and infections associated with damp conditions are rising.

This cannot be described as an surprise calamity. Winter arrives cyclically. People in Gaza interpret this shortcoming not as fate, but as being forsaken. People speak of how necessary items are restricted or delayed, while attempts to reinforce weakened structures are repeatedly obstructed. Local initiatives have tried to make do, to hand out tarps, yet they are still constrained by restrictions on imports. The root cause is political and humanitarian. Solutions exist, but are prevented from arriving.

An Unnecessary Pain

What makes this suffering especially agonizing is how unnecessary it should be. No individual ought to study, raise children, or fight illness standing knee-high in cold water inside a tent. No learner should dread the rain destroying their final textbook. Rain lays bare just how precarious existence is. It tests bodies worn down by pressure, weariness, and sorrow.

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