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It was around 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I returned home in Gaza City. A strong wind was blowing, making it impossible to remain any longer, so walking was my only option. At first, it was just a gentle sprinkle, but following a brief walk the rain suddenly grew heavier. That wasn’t surprising. I stopped near a tent, trying to warm my hands to generate a little heat. A young boy sat nearby selling sweet treats. We spoke briefly as I waited, although he appeared disengaged. I noticed the cookies were poorly packaged in plastic, already soggy from the drizzle, and I wondered if he’d have enough to sell before the night ended. The cold seeped into everything.

A Trek Through a Place of Tents

While traversing al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, canvas structures flanked both sides of the road. There were no voices from inside them, just the noise of rain pouring down and the whistle of the wind. Quickening my pace, seeking escape from the rain, I turned on my mobile phone's torch to illuminate the path. My thoughts kept returning to those sheltering inside: How are they passing the time now? What are they thinking? What emotions do they hold? The cold was piercing. I imagined children nestled under wet blankets, parents adjusting repeatedly to keep them warm.

When I opened the door to my apartment, the icy doorknob served as a quiet but powerful reminder of the hardships endured across Gaza in these harsh winter conditions. I entered my apartment and was overwhelmed by the guilt of enjoying a dry home when countless others faced exposure to the storm.

The Night Escalates

During the darkest hours, the storm reached its peak. Outside, tarps on damaged glass sagged and flapped violently, while corrugated metal broke away and crashed to the ground. Above it all came the desperate, terrified shouts of children, cutting through the darkness. I felt totally incapable.

During recent days, the rain has been unending. Cold, heavy, and driven by strong winds, it has soaked tents, flooded makeshift camps and turned the soil into mud. In other places, this might be called “bad weather”. In Gaza, it is experienced amidst exposure and abandonment.

Al-Arba’iniya

Residents refer to this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the most bitter forty 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 unleashes its intensity. Normally, it is weathered through preparation and shelter. This year, Gaza has no such defenses. The chill penetrates through homes, streets are vacant and people simply endure.

But the threat posed by the cold 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 shelled home collapsed in northern Gaza, freeing five additional individuals, including a child and two women. Two people remain missing. These incidents are not new attacks, but the result of homes weakened by months of bombardment and succumbing to winter rain. Not long ago, an eight-month-old baby girl in Khan Younis passed away from exposure to the cold.

Fragile Shelters

Walking past the camp nearest my home, I saw the consequences up close. Inadequate coverings strained under the weight of water, mattresses bobbed in water 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 claiming life and health for a vast population living in tents and packed sanctuaries.

The majority of these individuals have already been displaced, many several times over. Homes are lost. Neighbourhoods flattened. Winter has come to Gaza, but defense against it has not. It has come devoid of safe refuge, without electricity, lacking heat.

The Weight on Education

In my role as a professor in Gaza, this weather is a heavy burden. My students are not distant names; they are faces I recognize; bright, resilient, but deeply weary. Most attend online classes from tents; others from packed rooms where personal space doesn't exist and connectivity unreliable. Many of my students have already lost family members. Most have been rendered homeless. Yet they persist in learning. Their fortitude is remarkable, but it must not be demanded in this way.

In Gaza, what would normally count as routine academic practices—tasks, schedules—become questions of conscience, dictated every moment by anxiety over students’ well-being, comfort and proximity to protection.

When the storm rages, I find myself thinking about them. Are they dry? Are they warm? Did the wind tear through their shelter while they were trying to sleep? For those still living in apartments, or what remains of them, there is a lack of heat. With electricity scarce and fuel rare, warmth comes mainly from donning extra clothing and using the few bedding items available. Nonetheless, cold nights are excruciating. How then those living in tents?

The Humanitarian Shortfall

Reports indicate that well over a million people in Gaza live in shelters. Relief items, including insulated tents, have been far from enough. Amid the last tempest, aid organizations reported providing tarpaulins, tents and bedding to numerous households. For those affected, however, this assistance was often perceived as uneven and inadequate, limited to short-term fixes that were largely ineffective against prolonged exposure to cold, wind and rain. Tents collapse. Sicknesses, hypothermia, and infections linked to damp conditions are rising.

This goes beyond an unforeseen disaster. Winter is an annual event. People in Gaza view this crisis not as fate, but as being forsaken. People speak of how necessary items are blocked or slowed, while attempts to fix broken houses are repeatedly obstructed. Local initiatives have tried to improvise, to distribute plastic sheeting, yet they remain limited by restrictions on imports. The root cause is political and humanitarian. Remedies are known, but are kept out.

A Preventable Suffering

What makes this suffering 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 ruining their last notebook. Rain reveals just how fragile life has become. It strains physiques worn down by stress, exhaustion, and grief.

This winter occurs alongside the Christmas season that, for millions, epitomizes warmth, refuge and care for the most vulnerable. In Palestine, that {symbolism