🔗 Share this article

The time was approximately 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I made my way home in Gaza City. Gusts of wind blew, forcing me inside any longer, so I had to walk. Initially, it was only a light drizzle, but after about 200 metres the rain became a downpour. This was expected. I stopped near a tent, rubbing my palms together to fight off the chill. A young boy had positioned himself selling baked goods. We shared brief remarks while I stood there, although he appeared disengaged. I saw the cookies were hastily covered in plastic, moist from the drizzle, and I pondered if he’d have enough to sell before the night ended. A deep chill permeated the air.

A Trek Through a City of Tents

Walking down al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, canvas structures flanked both sides of the road. An eerie silence replaced voices from inside them, merely the din of rain pouring down and the roar of the wind. Quickening my pace, attempting to avoid the rain, I activated my mobile phone's torch to illuminate the path. My mind continually drifted to those huddled within: What occupies them now? What is their state of mind? What emotions do they hold? A severe chill gripped the air. I pictured children nestled under soaked bedding, parents shifting constantly to keep them warm.

When I opened the door to my apartment, the cold metal served as a quiet but powerful reminder of the struggles borne across Gaza in these severe cold season. I stepped inside my apartment and felt consumed by the guilt of having a roof when countless others faced exposure to the storm.

The Night Worsens

In the middle of the night, the storm grew stronger. Outside, makeshift covers on damaged glass whipped and strained, while metal sheets ripped free and crashed to the ground. Cutting through the chaos came the sharp, panicked screams of children, piercing the darkness. I felt completely helpless.

For the last fortnight, the rain has been unending. 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 “poor conditions”. In Gaza, it is experienced amidst exposure and abandonment.

Al-Arba’iniya

Palestinians know this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the most bitter forty days of winter, commencing in late December and lasting until the end of January. It is the real onset of winter, the moment when the season reveals its full force. Ordinarily, it is weathered through preparation and shelter. Currently, Gaza has no such defenses. The cold bites through homes, streets are deserted and people just persevere.

But the peril of the season is far from theoretical. Early on the Sunday before Christmas, rescue operations retrieved the remains of two children after the roof of a war-damaged building collapsed in northern Gaza, saving five more people, 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 compromised after months of bombardment and succumbing to winter rain. Earlier this month, an infant in Khan Younis passed away from exposure to the cold.

Precarious Existence

Observing the camp nearest my home, I observed the results up close. Thin plastic sheets sagged under the weight of water, mattresses floated and clothes hung damply, always damp. Each step highlighted how vulnerable these tents are and how close the rain and cold threatened life and health for a vast population living in tents and cramped refuges.

A great number of these residents have already been uprooted, many repeatedly. Homes are destroyed. Neighbourhoods razed. Winter has arrived in Gaza, but shelter from its fury has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, in darkness, devoid of warmth.

The Weight on Education

In my role as a professor in Gaza, this weather causes deep concern. My students are not mere statistics; they are young people I speak to; bright, resilient, but deeply weary. Most join virtual lessons from tents; others from overcrowded shelters where privacy is impossible and connectivity unreliable. Countless learners have already experienced bereavement. Most have been rendered homeless. Yet they persist in learning. Their fortitude is remarkable, but it should not be required in this way.

In Gaza, what would typically constitute routine academic practices—projects, due dates—turn into questions of conscience, dictated every moment by concern for students’ safety, warmth and access to shelter.

When the storm rages, I am constantly preoccupied about them. Do they have dryness? Are they warm? Has the gale ripped through their shelter while they were trying to sleep? For those remaining in apartments, or damaged structures, there is an absence of warmth. With electricity mostly absent and fuel in short supply, warmth comes mostly via bundling up and using the few bedding items available. Even so, cold nights are excruciating. How then those living in tents?

Aid and Abandonment

Figures show that well over a million people in Gaza reside in temporary housing. Aid supplies, including weatherproof shelters, have been insufficient. During the recent storm, humanitarian partners reported delivering coverings, shelters and sleeping materials to numerous households. For those affected, however, this assistance was often perceived as patchy and insufficient, limited to temporary solutions that did little against prolonged exposure to cold, wind and rain. Shelters fail. Chest infections, hypothermia, and infections linked to damp conditions are increasing.

This goes beyond an unforeseen disaster. Winter comes every year. People in Gaza understand this failure not as bad luck, but as being forsaken. People speak of how critical supplies are restricted or delayed, while attempts to fix broken houses are frequently blocked. Community efforts have tried to make do, to hand out tarps, yet they remain limited by what is allowed to enter. The culpability lies in political and humanitarian. Solutions exist, but are withheld.

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 battle sickness standing ankle-deep in cold water inside a tent. No learner should dread the rain damaging their precious phone. Rain exposes just how fragile life has become. It challenges health worn down by stress, exhaustion, and grief.

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