🔗 Share this article

The time was about 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I headed back home in Gaza City. A strong wind was blowing, and I couldn’t stay out any longer, leaving me to walk. Initially, it was just a gentle sprinkle, but after about 200 metres the rain suddenly grew heavier. This was expected. I paused beside a tent, trying to warm my hands to generate a little heat. A young boy was sitting outside selling baked goods. We exchanged a few words while I stood there, but his attention was elsewhere. I saw the cookies were hastily covered in plastic, dampened from the drizzle, and I questioned if he’d find buyers before the night ended. The freezing temperature invaded every space.

A Journey Through a Landscape of Tents

Walking down al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, tents lined both sides of the road. There were no voices from inside them, only the sound of torrential rain and the whistle of the wind. As I hurried on, seeking escape from the rain, I activated my mobile phone's torch to illuminate the path. My thoughts kept returning to those sheltering inside: What are they doing now? What is their state of mind? How do they feel? It was bitterly cold. I imagined children huddled under soaked bedding, parents moving restlessly to keep them warm.

Upon opening the door to my apartment, the freezing handle served as a understated yet stark reminder of the suffering faced across Gaza in these brutal winter climate. I stepped inside my apartment and couldn't shake the guilt of possessing shelter when countless others faced exposure to the storm.

The Midnight Hour Worsens

During the darkest hours, the storm intensified. Outside, tarps on broken panes whipped and strained, while tin roofing broke away and fell with a clatter. Above it all came the piercing, fearful cries of children, shattering the darkness. I felt totally incapable.

For the last fortnight, the rain has been unending. Cold, heavy, and driven 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 lived with exposure and abandonment.

The Cruelest Season

Locals call this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the 40 coldest and harshest 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 unleashes its intensity. Typically, it is faced with preparation and shelter. Now, Gaza has no such defenses. The cold bites through homes, streets are empty and people merely survive.

But the threat posed by the cold is no longer abstract. In the early hours of Sunday before Christmas, civil defense teams recovered the bodies 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. These incidents are not caused by ongoing hostilities, but the result of homes weakened by months of bombardment and ultimately defeated by winter rain. Earlier this month, an infant in Khan Younis passed away from exposure to the cold.

Precarious Existence

Passing by the camp nearest my home, I witnessed the impact up close. Flimsy tarpaulins sagged under the weight of water, mattresses bobbed in water and clothes hung damply, always damp. Each step reminded me how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold came to claiming life and health for hundreds of thousands living in tents and overcrowded shelters.

Most of these people have already been forced from their homes, many several times over. Homes are lost. Neighbourhoods leveled. Winter has descended upon Gaza, but shelter from its fury has not. It has come devoid of safe refuge, with no power, lacking heat.

Students in the Storm

Being an educator in Gaza, this weather is a heavy burden. My students are not figures in a report; they are faces I recognize; intelligent, determined, but deeply weary. Most participate in digital sessions from tents; others from overcrowded shelters 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 should not be required in this way.

In Gaza, what would usually be routine academic practices—assignments, deadlines—transform into ethical dilemmas, influenced daily by anxiety over students’ well-being, comfort and ability to find refuge.

When the storm rages, I find myself thinking about them. Are they dry? Is there heat? Has the gale ripped through their shelter during the night? For those remaining in apartments, or what remains of them, there is no heating. With electricity scarce and fuel in short supply, warmth comes mainly from donning extra clothing and using whatever blankets are left. Despite this, cold nights are excruciating. What about those living in tents?

Political Failure

Agencies state that over a million people in Gaza reside in temporary housing. Aid supplies, including weatherproof shelters, have been far from enough. Amid the last tempest, relief groups reported delivering tarpaulins, tents and bedding to a multitude of people. On the ground, however, this assistance was widely experienced as inconsistent and lacking, limited to short-term fixes that did little 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 unforeseen disaster. Winter comes every year. People in Gaza view this crisis not as misfortune, but as abandonment. People speak of how essential materials are blocked or slowed, while attempts to reinforce weakened structures are frequently blocked. Local initiatives have tried to improvise, to hand out tarps, yet they continue to be hampered by what is allowed to enter. The failure is political and humanitarian. Answers are available, but are prevented from arriving.

A Preventable Suffering

What makes this suffering especially heartbreaking is how unnecessary it should be. No individual ought to study, raise children, or battle sickness standing surrounded by cold water inside a tent. No student should fear the rain damaging their precious phone. Rain lays bare just how precarious existence is. It strains physiques worn down by anxiety, fatigue, and loss.

The current cold season aligns with the Christmas season that, for millions, epitomizes warmth, refuge and care for the disadvantaged. In Palestine, that {symbolism