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The clock read about 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I made my way home in Gaza City. Gusts of wind blew, and I couldn’t stay out any longer, leaving me to walk. In the beginning, it was only a light drizzle, but following a brief walk the rain intensified abruptly. It came as no shock. I took shelter by a tent, rubbing my palms together to generate a little heat. A young boy had positioned himself selling homemade cookies. We spoke briefly during my pause, but his attention was elsewhere. I observed the cookies were loosely wrapped in plastic, already soggy from the drizzle, and I questioned if he’d find buyers before the night ended. The freezing temperature invaded every space.

A Journey Through a Place of Tents

While traversing al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, tents lined both sides of the road. An eerie silence replaced voices from inside them, merely the din of falling water and the whistle of the wind. Quickening my pace, trying to dodge the rain, I switched on my mobile phone's torch to light my way. My thoughts kept returning to those huddled within: What occupies them now? What are they thinking? How do they feel? A severe chill gripped the air. I pictured children huddled under soaked bedding, parents adjusting repeatedly to keep them warm.

As I unlocked the door to my apartment, the freezing handle served as a quiet but powerful reminder of the struggles borne across Gaza in these severe cold season. I stepped inside my apartment and was overwhelmed by the guilt of enjoying a dry home when a multitude remained unprotected to the storm.

The Night Intensifies

As midnight passed, the storm intensified. Outside, tarps on shattered windows whipped and strained, while metal sheets broke away and slammed down. Overriding the noise came the piercing, fearful cries of children, shattering the darkness. I felt completely helpless.

Over the past two weeks, the rain has been incessant. Chilly, dense, and propelled by strong winds, it has drenched shelters, flooded makeshift camps and turned open ground into mud. In other places, this might be called “bad weather”. In Gaza, it is lived with exposure and abandonment.

Al-Arba’iniya

Palestinians know this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the 40 coldest and harshest days of winter, beginning in late December and persisting to the end of January. It is the definite start of winter, the moment when the season unleashes its intensity. Typically, it is weathered through preparation and shelter. This year, Gaza has neither. The chill penetrates through homes, streets are deserted and people simply endure.

But the threat posed by the cold is far from theoretical. On the Sunday morning before Christmas, rescue operations 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. Such collapses are not caused by ongoing hostilities, but the consequence of homes compromised after months of bombardment and succumbing to winter rain. In recent days, an infant in Khan Younis passed away from exposure to the cold.

A Life in Tents

Passing by the camp nearest my home, I witnessed the impact up close. Thin plastic sheets buckled beneath the weight of water, mattresses were adrift and clothes were perpetually moist, incapable of drying. Each step highlighted how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold came to taking life and health for a vast population living in tents and packed sanctuaries.

Most of these people have already been displaced, many on multiple occasions. Homes are lost. Neighbourhoods flattened. Winter has arrived in Gaza, but protection from it has not. It has come devoid of safe refuge, in darkness, devoid of warmth.

The Weight on Education

Being an educator in Gaza, this weather is a heavy burden. My students are not figures in a report; they are faces I recognize; smart, persistent, but extremely fatigued. Most join virtual lessons from tents; others from cramped quarters where privacy is impossible and connectivity sporadic. Countless learners have already experienced bereavement. Most have been rendered homeless. Yet they continue their education. Their perseverance is astounding, but it should not be required in this way.

In Gaza, what would usually be routine academic practices—projects, due dates—turn into ethical dilemmas, shaped each day by concern for students’ safety, warmth and proximity to protection.

During nights like these, I am constantly preoccupied about them. Do they have dryness? Do they feel any warmth? Has the gale ripped through their shelter as they attempted to rest? For those still living in apartments, or the shells that are left, there is a lack of heat. With electricity scarce and fuel scarce, warmth comes mainly from bundling up and using any remaining covers. Even so, cold nights are unbearable. What about those living in tents?

Political Failure

Agencies state that well over a million people in Gaza reside in temporary housing. Aid supplies, including weatherproof shelters, have been inadequate. When the cyclone hit, aid organizations reported delivering coverings, shelters and sleeping materials to a multitude of people. For those affected, however, this assistance was frequently felt to be inconsistent and lacking, limited to band-aid measures that offered scant protection against ongoing suffering to cold, wind and rain. Shelters fail. Respiratory illnesses, hypothermia, and infections linked to damp conditions are rising.

This cannot be described as an unforeseen disaster. Winter is an annual event. People in Gaza view this crisis not as bad luck, but as abandonment. People speak of how essential materials are blocked or slowed, while attempts to fix broken houses are consistently hampered. Grassroots projects have tried to improvise, to provide coverings, yet they are still constrained by what is allowed to enter. The root cause is political and humanitarian. Solutions exist, but are kept out.

A Symbolic Season

The factor that intensifies this hardship especially agonizing is how unnecessary it should be. No one should have to study, raise children, or fight illness standing knee-high in cold water inside a tent. No student should fear the rain destroying their final textbook. Rain exposes just how fragile life has become. It challenges health worn down by anxiety, fatigue, and loss.

The current cold season aligns with the Christmas season that, for millions, symbolises warmth, refuge and care for the neediest. In Palestine, that {symbolism