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It was about 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I returned home in Gaza City. The wind howled, forcing me inside any longer, so I had to walk. In the beginning, it was merely a soft rain, but following a brief walk the rain intensified abruptly. This was expected. I stopped near a tent, rubbing my palms together to fight off the chill. A young boy had positioned himself selling sweet treats. We spoke briefly during my pause, although he appeared disengaged. I saw the cookies were loosely wrapped in plastic, dampened from the drizzle, and I questioned if he’d have enough to sell before the night ended. The freezing temperature invaded every space.

A Walk Through a Landscape of Tents

As I walked along al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, canvas structures flanked both sides of the road. An eerie silence replaced voices from inside them, only the sound of falling water and the whistle of the wind. Rushing forward, trying to dodge the rain, I activated my mobile phone's torch to light my way. My mind continually drifted to those taking refuge within: How are they passing the time now? What are they thinking? How do they feel? A severe chill gripped the air. I pictured children curled under wet blankets, parents shifting constantly to keep them warm.

Upon opening the door to my apartment, the freezing handle served as a quiet but powerful reminder of the struggles borne across Gaza in these brutal winter climate. I entered my apartment and couldn't shake the guilt of enjoying a dry home when so many were exposed to the storm.

The Midnight Hour Worsens

During the darkest hours, the storm grew stronger. Outside, tarps on shattered windows sagged and flapped violently, while tin roofing ripped free and fell with a clatter. Cutting through the chaos came the piercing, fearful cries of children, piercing the darkness. I felt utterly powerless.

During recent days, the rain has been unending. Freezing, pouring, and carried by strong winds, it has flooded makeshift homes, flooded makeshift camps and turned the soil into mud. Elsewhere, this might be called “poor conditions”. 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, commencing in late December and lasting until the end of January. It is the definite start of winter, the moment when the season reveals its full force. Normally, it is weathered through preparation and shelter. Currently, Gaza has no such defenses. The cold bites through homes, streets are vacant and people merely survive.

But the danger of winter is far from theoretical. In the early hours of Sunday before Christmas, civil defense teams recovered the bodies 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 have not been found. These structural failures are not the result of fresh strikes, but the outcome of homes damaged from months of bombardment and finally undone by winter rain. Not long ago, a young child in Khan Younis died of exposure to the cold.

A Life in Tents

Observing 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, always damp. Each step reinforced how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold came to taking life and health for hundreds of thousands living in tents and cramped refuges.

A great number of these residents have already been displaced, many several times over. Homes are destroyed. Neighbourhoods razed. Winter has descended upon Gaza, but defense against it has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, without electricity, lacking heat.

A Teacher's Anguish

Being an educator in Gaza, this weather weighs heavily on me. My students are not mere statistics; they are young people I speak to; intelligent, determined, but profoundly exhausted. Most attend online classes from tents; others from overcrowded shelters where personal space doesn't exist and connectivity unreliable. Many of my students have already lost family members. Most have seen their houses destroyed. Yet they persist in learning. Their fortitude is remarkable, but it should not be required in this way.

In Gaza, what would usually be routine academic practices—tasks, schedules—transform into ethical dilemmas, shaped each day by concern for students’ well-being, comfort and access to shelter.

When the storm rages, I am constantly preoccupied about them. Do they have dryness? Do they feel any warmth? Did the wind tear through their shelter during the night? For those residing in apartments, or damaged structures, there is an absence of warmth. With electricity scarce and fuel rare, warmth comes primarily through bundling up and using any remaining covers. Nonetheless, cold nights are intolerable. What about those living in tents?

Political Failure

Reports indicate that well over a million people in Gaza live in shelters. Relief items, including insulated tents, have been inadequate. Amid the last tempest, humanitarian partners reported providing plastic sheets, tents and mattresses to a multitude of people. On the ground, however, this assistance was frequently felt to be patchy and insufficient, limited to band-aid measures that were largely ineffective against prolonged exposure to cold, wind and rain. Shelters fail. Sicknesses, hypothermia, and infections caused by damp conditions are increasing.

This goes beyond an unforeseen disaster. Winter is an annual event. People in Gaza understand this failure not as bad luck, but as abandonment. People speak of how essential materials are restricted or delayed, while attempts to repair damaged homes are frequently blocked. Community efforts have tried to make do, to provide coverings, yet they continue to be hampered by bureaucratic barriers. The failure is political and humanitarian. Remedies are known, but are kept out.

An Unnecessary Pain

What makes this suffering especially agonizing is how preventable it is. It is unconscionable to study, raise children, or combat disease standing surrounded by cold water inside a tent. No learner should dread the rain ruining their last notebook. Rain lays bare just how fragile life has become. It strains physiques worn down by stress, exhaustion, and grief.

This year's chill occurs alongside the Christmas season that, for millions, represents warmth, refuge and care for the disadvantaged. In Palestine, that {symbolism