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The time was about 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I returned home in Gaza City. Gusts of wind blew, making it impossible to remain any longer, leaving me to walk. Initially, it was just a gentle sprinkle, but following a brief walk the rain intensified abruptly. This was expected. I stopped near a tent, rubbing my palms together to draw some warmth. A young boy had positioned himself selling sweet treats. We spoke briefly as I waited, but his attention was elsewhere. I observed the cookies were poorly packaged in plastic, dampened from the drizzle, and I pondered if he’d manage to sell them all before the night ended. A deep chill permeated the air.

A Trek Through a Landscape of Tents

As I walked along al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, makeshift shelters crowded both sides of the road. An eerie silence replaced voices from inside them, only the sound of falling water and the moan of the wind. Rushing forward, trying to dodge the rain, I activated my mobile phone's torch to light my way. I couldn't stop thinking to those sheltering inside: What occupies them now? What is their state of mind? How do they feel? It was bitterly cold. I imagined children nestled under damp covers, parents adjusting repeatedly to keep them warm.

As I unlocked the door to my apartment, the cold metal served as a understated yet stark reminder of the hardships endured across Gaza in these severe cold season. I stepped inside my apartment and felt consumed by the guilt of possessing shelter when countless others faced exposure to the storm.

The Midnight Hour Worsens

During the darkest hours, the storm grew stronger. Outside, makeshift covers on broken panes billowed and tore, while corrugated metal ripped free and crashed to the ground. Overriding the noise came the sharp, panicked screams of children, piercing the darkness. I felt totally incapable.

Over the past two weeks, the rain has been incessant. Freezing, pouring, and carried by strong winds, it has drenched shelters, flooded makeshift camps and turned bare earth into mud. In other places, this might be called “inclement 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, beginning in late December and lasting until the end of January. It is the true beginning of winter, the moment when the season shows its true power. Normally, it is faced with preparation and shelter. Now, Gaza has neither. The frost seeps through homes, streets are empty and people simply endure.

But the peril of the season is far from theoretical. In the early hours of Sunday before Christmas, rescue operations recovered the bodies of two children after the roof of a shelled home collapsed in northern Gaza, saving five more people, including a child and two women. Two people remain missing. These incidents are not caused by ongoing hostilities, but the consequence of homes weakened by months of bombardment and ultimately defeated by winter rain. In recent days, an infant in Khan Younis passed away from exposure to the cold.

Fragile Shelters

Passing by the camp nearest my home, I saw the consequences up close. Flimsy tarpaulins sagged under the weight of water, mattresses bobbed in water and clothes hung damply, incapable of drying. Each step reminded me 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.

The majority of these individuals have already been forced from their homes, many several times over. Homes are destroyed. Neighbourhoods flattened. Winter has descended upon Gaza, but shelter from its fury has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, with no power, devoid of warmth.

A Teacher's Anguish

In my role as a professor in Gaza, this weather causes deep concern. My students are not figures in a report; they are faces I recognize; intelligent, determined, but extremely fatigued. Most participate in digital sessions from tents; others from overcrowded shelters where personal space doesn't exist and connectivity intermittent. Many of my students have already lost family members. Most have lost their homes. Yet they continue their education. Their resilience is extraordinary, but it ought not be necessary in this way.

In Gaza, what would normally count as routine academic practices—projects, due dates—turn into ethical dilemmas, influenced daily by concern for students’ safety, warmth and ability to find refuge.

When the storm rages, I find myself thinking about them. Do they have dryness? Do they feel any warmth? Has the gale ripped through their shelter during the night? For those residing in apartments, or damaged structures, there is an absence of warmth. With electricity largely unavailable and fuel rare, warmth comes primarily through wearing multiple layers and using the few bedding items available. Nonetheless, cold nights are intolerable. How then those living in tents?

Political Failure

Figures show that well over a million people in Gaza live in shelters. Humanitarian assistance, including insulated tents, have been inadequate. When the cyclone hit, humanitarian partners reported delivering plastic sheets, tents and mattresses to a multitude of people. On the ground, however, this assistance was widely experienced as inconsistent and lacking, limited to temporary solutions that were largely ineffective against ongoing suffering to cold, wind and rain. Tents collapse. Chest infections, hypothermia, and infections associated with damp conditions are rising.

This goes beyond an surprise calamity. Winter comes every year. People in Gaza interpret this shortcoming not as misfortune, but as being forsaken. People speak of how critical supplies are blocked or slowed, while attempts to reinforce weakened structures are consistently hampered. Community efforts 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. Remedies are known, but are kept out.

An Unnecessary Pain

The aspect that renders this pain especially heartbreaking is how preventable it is. 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 precarious existence is. It strains physiques worn down by pressure, weariness, and sorrow.

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