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It was about 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I headed back home in Gaza City. The wind howled, making it impossible to remain any longer, leaving me to walk. Initially, it was just a gentle sprinkle, but after about 200 metres the rain intensified abruptly. That wasn’t surprising. I paused beside a tent, rubbing my palms together to draw some warmth. A young boy sat nearby selling sweet treats. We spoke briefly while I stood there, though he didn’t seem interested. I noticed the cookies were loosely wrapped in plastic, moist from the drizzle, and I wondered if he’d have enough to sell before the night ended. The cold seeped into everything.

A Walk Through a Place of Tents

While traversing 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 falling water and the moan of the wind. As I hurried on, seeking escape from the rain, I activated my mobile phone's torch to illuminate the path. I couldn't stop thinking to those huddled within: What are they doing now? What thoughts fill their minds? How do they feel? The cold was piercing. I pictured children huddled under wet blankets, parents moving restlessly to keep them warm.

Upon opening the door to my apartment, the icy doorknob served as a quiet but powerful reminder of the hardships endured 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 Escalates

In the middle of the night, the storm intensified. Outside, tarps on damaged glass billowed and tore, while metal sheets ripped free and crashed to the ground. Cutting through the chaos came the desperate, terrified shouts of children, cutting through the darkness. I felt completely helpless.

For the last fortnight, the rain has been incessant. Cold, heavy, and driven by strong winds, it has flooded makeshift homes, flooded makeshift camps and turned bare earth into mud. In other places, this might be called “poor conditions”. In Gaza, it is endured in a state of exposure and abandonment.

The Harshest Days

Locals call this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the fourty most severe days of winter, beginning in late December and continuing through the end of January. It is the true beginning of winter, the moment when the season shows its true power. Ordinarily, it is faced with preparation and shelter. Currently, Gaza has no such defenses. The frost seeps through homes, streets are empty and people merely survive.

But the danger of winter is now very real. On the Sunday morning before Christmas, civil defense teams found the victims of two children after the roof of a bombarded structure collapsed in northern Gaza, rescuing five others, including a child and two women. Two people have not been found. Such collapses 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 eight-month-old baby girl in Khan Younis died of exposure to the cold.

A Life in Tents

Passing by the camp nearest my home, I observed the results up close. Inadequate coverings strained under the weight of water, mattresses floated and clothes hung damply, never fully drying. Each step reinforced how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold threatened life and health for hundreds of thousands living in tents and overcrowded shelters.

A great number of these residents have already been displaced, many several times over. Homes are lost. Neighbourhoods razed. Winter has arrived in Gaza, but shelter from its fury has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, in darkness, without heating.

A Teacher's Anguish

Being an educator in Gaza, this weather is a heavy burden. My students are not figures in a report; they are faces I recognize; smart, persistent, but profoundly exhausted. Most attend online classes from tents; others from overcrowded shelters where solitude is unattainable and connectivity intermittent. A significant number of pupils have already experienced bereavement. Most have been rendered homeless. Yet they still try to study. Their perseverance is astounding, but it must not be demanded in this way.

In Gaza, what would normally count as routine academic practices—tasks, schedules—transform into questions of conscience, influenced daily by anxiety over students’ safety, warmth and ability to find refuge.

When the storm rages, I find myself thinking about them. Do they have dryness? Are they warm? Did the wind tear through their shelter while they were trying to sleep? For those remaining in apartments, or the shells that are left, there is an absence of warmth. With electricity mostly absent and fuel scarce, warmth comes mostly via wearing multiple layers and using the few bedding items available. Even so, cold nights are intolerable. 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 thermal blankets, have been insufficient. During the recent storm, relief groups reported providing coverings, shelters and sleeping materials to a multitude of people. On the ground, however, this assistance was frequently felt to be uneven and inadequate, limited to temporary solutions that offered scant protection against ongoing suffering to cold, wind and rain. Tents collapse. Sicknesses, hypothermia, and infections associated with damp conditions are increasing.

This goes beyond an unexpected catastrophe. Winter comes every year. People in Gaza understand this failure not as fate, but as being forsaken. People speak of how critical supplies are hindered or postponed, while attempts to repair damaged homes are repeatedly obstructed. Local initiatives have tried to find solutions, to distribute plastic sheeting, yet they continue to be hampered by what is allowed to enter. The failure is political and humanitarian. Answers are available, but are kept out.

A Preventable Suffering

The aspect that renders this pain especially agonizing is how unnecessary it should be. It is unconscionable to study, raise children, or battle sickness standing surrounded by cold water inside a tent. No learner should dread the rain damaging their precious phone. Rain exposes 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, represents warmth, refuge and care for the neediest. In Palestine, that {symbolism