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The clock read approximately 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I made my way home in Gaza City. The wind howled, making it impossible to remain any longer, leaving me to walk. At first, it was merely a soft rain, but after about 200 metres 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 homemade cookies. We shared brief remarks while I stood there, although he appeared disengaged. I noticed the cookies were hastily covered in plastic, dampened from the drizzle, and I questioned if he’d manage to sell them all before the night ended. The cold seeped into everything.

A Walk 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, only the sound of rain pouring down and the roar of the wind. Rushing forward, 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: What are they doing now? What thoughts fill their minds? What are they experiencing? The cold was piercing. I envisioned children nestled under soaked bedding, parents moving restlessly 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 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 Darkness Escalates

During the darkest hours, the storm grew stronger. Outside, makeshift covers on damaged glass sagged and flapped violently, while tin roofing tore loose and fell with a clatter. Overriding the noise came the sharp, panicked screams 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 drenched shelters, swamped refugee areas and turned bare earth into mud. In other places, this might be called “bad weather”. In Gaza, it is lived with exposure and abandonment.

The Cruelest Season

Residents refer to this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the fourty most severe days of winter, commencing 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 cold bites through homes, streets are deserted and people just persevere.

But the danger of winter is no longer abstract. In the early hours of Sunday before Christmas, recovery efforts found the victims 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 have not been found. Such collapses are not new attacks, but the outcome of homes compromised after months of bombardment and finally undone by winter rain. In recent days, a young child in Khan Younis died of exposure to the cold.

Fragile Shelters

Observing the camp nearest my home, I observed the results up close. Thin plastic sheets strained under the weight of water, mattresses floated and clothes were perpetually moist, always damp. Each step highlighted how vulnerable these tents are and how close the rain and cold came to taking life and health for countless individuals living in tents and cramped refuges.

The majority of these individuals have already been uprooted, many repeatedly. Homes are destroyed. Neighbourhoods leveled. Winter has arrived in Gaza, but defense against it has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, in darkness, without heating.

A Teacher's Anguish

Being an educator in Gaza, this weather weighs heavily on me. My students are not mere statistics; they are faces I recognize; smart, persistent, but profoundly exhausted. Most join virtual lessons from tents; others from packed rooms where solitude is unattainable and connectivity unreliable. A significant number of pupils have already suffered personal loss. Most have lost their homes. Yet they continue their education. Their perseverance is astounding, but it must not be demanded in this way.

In Gaza, what would typically constitute routine academic practices—tasks, schedules—transform into moral negotiations, shaped each day by uncertainty about students’ security, heat and access to shelter.

When the storm rages, I find myself thinking about them. Are they dry? Do they feel any warmth? Could the storm have shredded through their shelter as they attempted to rest? For those residing in apartments, or damaged structures, there is no heating. With electricity mostly absent and fuel rare, warmth comes mostly via bundling up and using whatever blankets are left. Despite this, cold nights are intolerable. How then those living in tents?

Political Failure

Figures show that over a million people in Gaza reside in temporary housing. Aid supplies, including insulated tents, have been inadequate. Amid the last tempest, aid organizations reported delivering tarpaulins, tents and bedding to a multitude of people. In reality, however, this assistance was frequently felt to be patchy and insufficient, limited to band-aid measures that offered scant protection against extended hardship to cold, wind and rain. Tents collapse. Chest infections, hypothermia, and infections caused by damp conditions are on the upswing.

This is not an unforeseen disaster. Winter comes every year. People in Gaza view this crisis not as misfortune, but as being forsaken. People speak of how necessary items are hindered or postponed, while attempts to reinforce weakened structures are repeatedly obstructed. Local initiatives have tried to improvise, to hand out tarps, yet they remain limited by restrictions on imports. The failure is political and humanitarian. Answers are available, but are withheld.

A Preventable Suffering

The factor that intensifies this hardship especially heartbreaking is how preventable it is. No individual ought to study, raise children, or fight illness standing surrounded by cold water inside a tent. No learner should dread the rain destroying their final textbook. Rain lays bare just how fragile life has become. It strains physiques 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