It was approximately 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I made my way home in Gaza City. The wind howled, forcing me inside any longer, so walking was my only option. Initially, it was just a gentle sprinkle, but a short distance later the rain became a downpour. That wasn’t surprising. I paused beside a tent, trying to warm my hands to fight off the chill. A young boy had positioned himself selling homemade cookies. We spoke briefly as I waited, but his attention was elsewhere. I noticed the cookies were poorly packaged in plastic, moist from the drizzle, and I questioned if he’d have enough to sell before the night ended. The cold seeped into everything.
Walking down al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, makeshift shelters crowded both sides of the road. There were no voices from inside them, merely the din of falling water and the whistle of the wind. Rushing forward, trying to dodge the rain, I turned on my mobile phone's torch to light my way. My thoughts kept returning to those huddled within: How are they passing the time now? What are they thinking? What are they experiencing? It was bitterly cold. I envisioned children huddled under soaked bedding, parents adjusting repeatedly to keep them warm.
As I unlocked the door to my apartment, the cold metal served as a subtle yet haunting reminder of the suffering faced across Gaza in these severe cold season. I entered my apartment and was overwhelmed by the guilt of enjoying a dry home when so many were exposed to the storm.
As midnight passed, the storm reached its peak. Outside, tarps on shattered windows billowed and tore, while metal sheets broke away and fell with a clatter. Cutting through the chaos came the piercing, fearful cries of children, cutting through the darkness. I felt totally incapable.
Over the past two weeks, the rain has been incessant. Chilly, dense, and propelled by strong winds, it has drenched shelters, swamped refugee areas and turned the soil into mud. Elsewhere, this might be called “bad weather”. In Gaza, it is endured in a state of exposure and abandonment.
Palestinians know 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 definite start of winter, the moment when the season shows its true power. Ordinarily, it is faced with preparation and shelter. Currently, Gaza has neither. The cold bites through homes, streets are vacant and people simply endure.
But the danger of winter is no longer abstract. Early on the Sunday before Christmas, civil defense teams recovered the bodies 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 consequence of homes weakened by months of bombardment and ultimately defeated by winter rain. Earlier this month, an infant in Khan Younis succumbed to exposure to the cold.
Observing the camp nearest my home, I saw the consequences up close. Flimsy tarpaulins buckled beneath the weight of water, mattresses floated and clothes were perpetually moist, always damp. Each step highlighted how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold came to claiming life and health for countless individuals living in tents and overcrowded shelters.
The majority of these individuals have already been displaced, many on multiple occasions. Homes are lost. Neighbourhoods leveled. Winter has descended upon Gaza, but defense against it has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, in darkness, lacking heat.
As a university lecturer in Gaza, this weather is a heavy burden. My students are not mere statistics; they are faces I recognize; bright, resilient, but profoundly exhausted. Most attend online classes from tents; others from overcrowded shelters where personal space doesn't exist and connectivity sporadic. Countless learners have already lost family members. Most have been rendered homeless. Yet they continue their education. Their resilience is extraordinary, but it ought not be necessary in this way.
In Gaza, what would normally count as routine academic practices—tasks, schedules—transform into ethical dilemmas, influenced daily by uncertainty about students’ safety, warmth and ability to find refuge.
When the storm rages, I find myself thinking about them. Is their shelter holding? Do they feel any warmth? Could the storm have shredded through their shelter as they attempted to rest? For those residing in apartments, or the shells that are left, there is no heating. With electricity largely unavailable and fuel scarce, warmth comes mostly via bundling up and using the few bedding items available. Even so, cold nights are excruciating. What, then those living in tents?
Reports indicate that over a million people in Gaza reside in temporary housing. Relief items, including insulated tents, have been inadequate. Amid the last tempest, humanitarian partners reported delivering coverings, shelters and sleeping materials to a multitude of people. For those affected, however, this assistance was widely experienced as patchy and insufficient, limited to band-aid measures that did little against prolonged exposure to cold, wind and rain. Tents collapse. Sicknesses, hypothermia, and infections caused by damp conditions are increasing.
This cannot be described as an unexpected catastrophe. Winter comes every year. People in Gaza understand this failure not as bad luck, 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 find solutions, to distribute plastic sheeting, yet they remain limited by bureaucratic barriers. The root cause is political and humanitarian. Solutions exist, but are withheld.
The factor that intensifies this hardship especially heartbreaking is how preventable it is. It is unconscionable to study, raise children, or combat disease standing knee-high in cold water inside a tent. No learner should dread the rain ruining their last notebook. 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, represents warmth, refuge and care for the most vulnerable. In Palestine, that {symbolism
