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The time was approximately 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I made my way home in Gaza City. The wind howled, making it impossible to remain any longer, so I had to walk. Initially, it was merely a soft rain, but after about 200 metres the rain suddenly grew heavier. This was expected. I stopped near a tent, trying to warm my hands to generate a little heat. A young boy had positioned himself selling baked goods. We shared brief remarks during my pause, but his attention was elsewhere. I saw the cookies were hastily covered in plastic, dampened from the drizzle, and I pondered if he’d have enough to sell before the night ended. A deep chill permeated the air.

A Journey Through a City of Tents

As I walked along al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, makeshift shelters crowded both sides of the road. No sounds of conversation came from inside them, just the noise of falling water and the roar of the wind. Rushing forward, trying to dodge the rain, I switched on my mobile phone's torch to see the road ahead. My mind continually drifted to those taking refuge within: What are they doing now? What is their state of mind? How do they feel? It was bitterly cold. I pictured children curled under damp covers, parents adjusting repeatedly to keep them warm.

Upon opening the door to my apartment, the icy doorknob served as a subtle yet haunting reminder of the suffering faced across Gaza in these brutal winter climate. I walked into my apartment and was overwhelmed by the guilt of enjoying a dry home when a multitude remained unprotected to the storm.

The Night Worsens

During the darkest hours, the storm reached its peak. Outside, tarps on shattered windows whipped and strained, while metal sheets broke away and slammed down. Above it all came the sharp, panicked screams of children, shattering the darkness. I felt utterly powerless.

Over the past two weeks, the rain has been incessant. Freezing, pouring, and carried by strong winds, it has soaked tents, flooded makeshift camps and turned the soil into mud. In different contexts, this might be called “poor conditions”. 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, beginning in late December and continuing through the end of January. It is the real onset of winter, the moment when the season unleashes its intensity. Typically, it is faced with preparation and shelter. Now, Gaza has neither. The frost seeps through homes, streets are deserted and people simply endure.

But the threat posed by the cold is no longer abstract. In the early hours of Sunday before Christmas, recovery efforts recovered the bodies of two children after the roof of a bombarded structure collapsed in northern Gaza, freeing five additional individuals, including a child and two women. Two people have not been found. These structural failures are not caused by ongoing hostilities, but the outcome of homes damaged from months of bombardment and succumbing to winter rain. In recent days, an infant in Khan Younis succumbed to exposure to the cold.

Precarious Existence

Observing the camp nearest my home, I saw the consequences up close. Inadequate coverings sagged under the weight of water, mattresses bobbed in water and clothes hung damply, incapable of drying. Each step highlighted how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold threatened life and health for countless individuals living in tents and packed sanctuaries.

Most of these people have already been forced from their homes, many several times over. Homes are lost. Neighbourhoods leveled. Winter has descended upon Gaza, but defense against it has not. It has come without proper shelter, in darkness, devoid of warmth.

The Weight on Education

In my role as a professor in Gaza, this weather weighs heavily on me. My students are not figures in a report; they are faces I recognize; bright, resilient, but extremely fatigued. Most join virtual lessons from tents; others from overcrowded shelters where personal space doesn't exist and connectivity unreliable. A significant number of pupils have already experienced bereavement. Most have lost their homes. Yet they continue their education. Their resilience is extraordinary, but it must not be demanded in this way.

In Gaza, what would normally count as routine academic practices—assignments, deadlines—turn into ethical dilemmas, shaped each day by uncertainty about students’ safety, warmth and access to shelter.

During nights like these, I cannot help but wonder about them. Do they have dryness? Do they feel any warmth? Has the gale ripped through their shelter during the night? For those remaining in apartments, or what remains of them, there is a lack of heat. With electricity scarce and fuel scarce, warmth comes primarily through wearing multiple layers and using any remaining covers. Nonetheless, cold nights are excruciating. How then those living in tents?

The Humanitarian Shortfall

Agencies state that well over a million people in Gaza live in shelters. Relief items, including weatherproof shelters, have been inadequate. Amid the last tempest, relief groups reported distributing tarpaulins, tents and bedding to thousands of families. In reality, however, this assistance was frequently felt to be patchy and insufficient, limited to temporary solutions that offered scant protection against extended hardship to cold, wind and rain. Structures give way. Sicknesses, hypothermia, and infections linked to damp conditions are increasing.

This goes beyond an unexpected catastrophe. Winter is an annual event. People in Gaza understand this failure not as misfortune, but as abandonment. People speak of how critical supplies are restricted or delayed, while attempts to repair damaged homes are consistently hampered. Grassroots projects have tried to find solutions, to hand out tarps, yet they are still constrained by restrictions on imports. The culpability lies in political and humanitarian. Solutions exist, but are prevented from arriving.

A Preventable Suffering

What makes this suffering especially agonizing is how unnecessary it should be. It is unconscionable to study, raise children, or fight illness standing ankle-deep in cold water inside a tent. No learner should dread the rain damaging their precious phone. Rain lays bare just how vulnerable survival is. It tests bodies worn down by pressure, weariness, and sorrow.

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