🔗 Share this article

The time was about 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I returned home in Gaza City. A strong wind was blowing, forcing me inside any longer, leaving me to walk. In the beginning, it was merely a soft rain, but a short distance later the rain suddenly grew heavier. That wasn’t surprising. I stopped near a tent, trying to warm my hands to fight off the chill. A young boy had positioned himself selling baked goods. We spoke briefly as I waited, although he appeared disengaged. I noticed the cookies were hastily covered in plastic, dampened 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 Landscape 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, just the noise of torrential rain and the whistle of the wind. Rushing forward, trying to dodge the rain, I activated my mobile phone's torch to light my way. My mind continually drifted to those taking refuge within: What occupies them now? What are they thinking? How do they feel? The cold was piercing. I envisioned children nestled under damp covers, parents moving restlessly to keep them warm.

As I unlocked the door to my apartment, the freezing handle served as a quiet but powerful reminder of the suffering faced across Gaza in these brutal winter climate. I walked into my apartment and was overwhelmed by the guilt of having a roof when countless others faced exposure to the storm.

The Night Intensifies

As midnight passed, the storm reached its peak. Outside, plastic sheeting on broken panes sagged and flapped violently, while tin roofing tore loose and fell with a clatter. Overriding the noise came the sharp, panicked screams of children, piercing the darkness. I felt utterly powerless.

During recent days, the rain has been incessant. Chilly, dense, and propelled by strong winds, it has soaked tents, flooded makeshift camps and turned bare earth into mud. In other places, this might be called “inclement weather”. In Gaza, it is experienced amidst 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 lasting until 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. This year, Gaza has none of these. The chill penetrates through homes, streets are vacant and people simply endure.

But the danger of winter is now very real. In the early hours of Sunday before Christmas, civil defense teams found the victims of two children after the roof of a shelled home collapsed in northern Gaza, saving five more people, including a child and two women. Two people have not been found. Such collapses are not the result of fresh strikes, but the outcome of homes compromised after months of bombardment and ultimately defeated by winter rain. Not long ago, a young child in Khan Younis succumbed to exposure to the cold.

A Life in Tents

Walking past the camp nearest my home, I saw the consequences up close. Thin plastic sheets buckled beneath the weight of water, mattresses were adrift and clothes remained wet, always damp. Each step reinforced how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold threatened life and health for countless individuals living in tents and packed sanctuaries.

The majority of these individuals have already been forced from their homes, many several times over. Homes are gone. Neighbourhoods flattened. Winter has arrived in Gaza, but shelter from its fury has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, with no power, without heating.

A Teacher's Anguish

As a university lecturer in Gaza, this weather causes deep concern. My students are not distant names; they are young people I speak to; bright, resilient, but deeply weary. Most join virtual lessons from tents; others from cramped quarters where solitude is unattainable and connectivity sporadic. A significant number of pupils have already lost family members. Most have seen their houses destroyed. Yet they persist in learning. Their perseverance is astounding, but it ought not be necessary in this way.

In Gaza, what would usually be routine academic practices—projects, due dates—become questions of conscience, influenced daily by uncertainty about students’ well-being, comfort and ability to find refuge.

When the storm rages, I am constantly preoccupied about them. Is their shelter holding? Is there heat? Did the wind tear through their shelter during the night? For those still living in apartments, or what remains of them, there is a lack of heat. With electricity scarce and fuel in short supply, warmth comes mainly from bundling up and using the few bedding items available. Even so, cold nights are excruciating. What, then those living in tents?

The Humanitarian Shortfall

Figures show that more than a million people in Gaza exist in makeshift accommodations. Aid supplies, including weatherproof shelters, have been inadequate. Amid the last tempest, relief groups reported delivering plastic sheets, tents and mattresses to thousands of families. In reality, however, this assistance was widely experienced as patchy and insufficient, limited to band-aid measures that offered scant protection against ongoing suffering to cold, wind and rain. Shelters fail. Chest infections, hypothermia, and infections associated with damp conditions are on the upswing.

This is not an unforeseen disaster. Winter is an annual event. People in Gaza interpret this shortcoming not as fate, but as neglect. People speak of how critical supplies are restricted or delayed, while attempts to fix broken houses are repeatedly obstructed. Community efforts have tried to find solutions, to provide coverings, yet they are still constrained by what is allowed to enter. The failure is political and humanitarian. Remedies are known, but are withheld.

A Preventable Suffering

The factor that intensifies this hardship especially painful is how unnecessary it should be. No one should have to study, raise children, or combat disease standing knee-high in cold water inside a tent. No student should fear the rain ruining their last notebook. Rain reveals just how fragile life has become. It strains physiques worn down by pressure, weariness, and sorrow.

This year's chill coincides with the Christmas season that, for millions, epitomizes warmth, refuge and care for the disadvantaged. In Palestine, that {symbolism