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The time 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, leaving me to walk. Initially, it was just a gentle sprinkle, but a short distance later the rain became a downpour. This was expected. I stopped near a tent, clapping my hands to generate a little heat. A young boy was sitting outside selling baked goods. We exchanged a few words while I stood there, although he appeared disengaged. I observed the cookies were loosely wrapped in plastic, already soggy from the drizzle, and I questioned if he’d have enough to sell before the night ended. A deep chill permeated the air.

A Walk Through a Place of Tents

As I walked along al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, canvas structures flanked both sides of the road. There were no voices from inside them, merely the din of falling water and the whistle of the wind. As I hurried on, attempting to avoid the rain, I turned on my mobile phone's torch to light my way. My mind continually drifted to those huddled within: What are they doing now? What is their state of mind? What are they experiencing? The cold was piercing. I pictured children huddled under soaked bedding, parents adjusting repeatedly to keep them warm.

Upon opening the door to my apartment, the freezing handle served as a subtle yet haunting reminder of the struggles borne across Gaza in these brutal winter climate. I walked into my apartment and felt consumed by the guilt of enjoying a dry home when a multitude remained unprotected to the storm.

The Darkness Intensifies

In the middle of the night, the storm grew stronger. Outside, tarps on broken panes billowed and tore, while metal sheets broke away and slammed down. Cutting through the chaos came the sharp, panicked screams of children, cutting through the darkness. I felt utterly powerless.

During recent days, the rain has been incessant. Cold, heavy, and driven by strong winds, it has drenched shelters, flooded makeshift camps and turned open ground into mud. Elsewhere, this might be called “bad weather”. In Gaza, it is experienced amidst exposure and abandonment.

The Harshest Days

Residents refer to this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the 40 coldest and harshest days of winter, commencing in late December and continuing through the end of January. It is the real onset of winter, the moment when the season reveals its full force. Typically, it is endured with preparation and shelter. Currently, Gaza has none of these. The frost seeps through homes, streets are deserted and people simply endure.

But the threat posed by the cold is now very real. Early on the Sunday 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. These structural failures are not the result of fresh strikes, but the result of homes damaged from months of bombardment and succumbing to winter rain. Not long ago, a young child 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 sagged under the weight of water, mattresses bobbed in water and clothes were perpetually moist, always damp. Each step highlighted how precarious these dwellings are and how close the rain and cold threatened life and health for a vast population living in tents and cramped refuges.

Most of these people have already been displaced, many several times over. Homes are gone. Neighbourhoods razed. Winter has descended upon Gaza, but protection from it has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, with no power, lacking heat.

A Teacher's Anguish

Being an educator in Gaza, this weather is a heavy burden. My students are not figures in a report; they are faces I recognize; bright, resilient, but profoundly exhausted. Most attend online classes from tents; others from packed rooms where privacy is impossible and connectivity intermittent. Countless learners have already suffered personal loss. Most have lost their homes. Yet they still try to study. Their fortitude is remarkable, but it ought not be necessary in this way.

In Gaza, what would usually be routine academic practices—tasks, schedules—become questions of conscience, dictated every moment by anxiety over students’ security, heat and proximity to protection.

During nights like these, I am constantly preoccupied about them. Do they have dryness? Do they feel any warmth? Did the wind tear through their shelter as they attempted to rest? For those still living in apartments, or what remains of them, there is a lack of heat. With electricity largely unavailable and fuel rare, warmth comes mostly via wearing multiple layers and using whatever blankets are left. Even so, cold nights are unbearable. What, then those living in tents?

Aid and Abandonment

Agencies state that over a million people in Gaza live in shelters. Relief items, including thermal blankets, have been far from enough. During the recent storm, aid organizations reported distributing coverings, shelters and sleeping materials to numerous households. On the ground, however, this assistance was often perceived as inconsistent and lacking, limited to band-aid measures that were largely ineffective against ongoing suffering to cold, wind and rain. Structures give way. Sicknesses, hypothermia, and infections associated with damp conditions are increasing.

This goes beyond an unexpected catastrophe. Winter is an annual event. People in Gaza interpret this shortcoming not as bad luck, but as neglect. People speak of how critical supplies are hindered or postponed, while attempts to repair damaged homes are repeatedly obstructed. Local initiatives have tried to improvise, to distribute plastic sheeting, yet they are still constrained by bureaucratic barriers. The failure is political and humanitarian. Remedies are known, but are withheld.

A Symbolic Season

What makes this suffering especially painful is how unnecessary it should be. No one should have to study, raise children, or fight illness standing ankle-deep in cold water inside a tent. No student should fear the rain destroying their final textbook. Rain reveals just how vulnerable survival is. It challenges health worn down by stress, exhaustion, and grief.

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