Amid a Raging Gale, The Panicked Screams of Children in Tents Outside Echoed. This Marks Christmas in Gaza

It was about 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I made my way home in Gaza City. Gusts of wind blew, forcing me inside any longer, so walking was my only option. At first, it was just a gentle sprinkle, but following a brief walk the rain intensified abruptly. It came as no shock. I stopped near a tent, trying to warm my hands to draw some warmth. A young boy had positioned himself selling baked goods. We spoke briefly during my pause, though he didn’t seem interested. I observed the cookies were hastily covered in plastic, already soggy from the drizzle, and I questioned if he’d manage to sell them all before the night ended. The freezing temperature invaded every space.

A Walk Through a Place of Tents

As I walked along al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, tents lined both sides of the road. An eerie silence replaced voices from inside them, just the noise of falling water and the whistle of the wind. As I hurried on, trying to dodge the rain, I activated my mobile phone's torch to see the road ahead. I couldn't stop thinking to those sheltering inside: What are they doing now? What thoughts fill their minds? What emotions do they hold? The cold was piercing. I imagined children huddled under wet blankets, 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 brutal winter climate. I stepped inside my apartment and felt consumed by the guilt of possessing shelter when so many were exposed to the storm.

The Midnight Hour Intensifies

During the darkest hours, the storm grew stronger. Outside, tarps on damaged glass whipped and strained, while corrugated metal tore loose and crashed to the ground. Cutting through the chaos came the desperate, terrified shouts of children, piercing the darkness. I felt completely helpless.

Over the past two weeks, the rain has been unending. Cold, heavy, and driven by strong winds, it has drenched shelters, swamped refugee areas and turned open ground into mud. In other places, this might be called “inclement weather”. In Gaza, it is endured in a state of exposure and abandonment.

The Harshest Days

Residents refer to this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the fourty most severe days of winter, commencing in late December and persisting to the end of January. It is the definite start of winter, the moment when the season shows its true power. Normally, it is endured with preparation and shelter. Now, Gaza has no such defenses. The cold bites through homes, streets are vacant and people merely survive.

But the danger of winter is no longer abstract. In the early hours of Sunday before Christmas, civil defense teams retrieved the remains of two children after the roof of a shelled home collapsed in northern Gaza, freeing five additional individuals, including a child and two women. Two people are still unaccounted for. Such collapses are not new attacks, but the outcome of homes weakened by months of bombardment and ultimately defeated by winter rain. Earlier this month, an infant in Khan Younis died of exposure to the cold.

Precarious Existence

Passing by the camp nearest my home, I witnessed the impact up close. Inadequate coverings sagged under the weight of water, mattresses were adrift and clothes remained wet, incapable of drying. Each step highlighted how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold threatened life and health for a vast population living in tents and overcrowded shelters.

Most of these people have already been displaced, many repeatedly. Homes are lost. Neighbourhoods razed. Winter has come to Gaza, but protection from it has not. It has come devoid of safe refuge, without electricity, devoid of warmth.

A Teacher's Anguish

In my role as a professor in Gaza, this weather causes deep concern. My students are not mere statistics; they are individuals I know; intelligent, determined, but profoundly exhausted. Most join virtual lessons from tents; others from cramped quarters where personal space doesn't exist and connectivity unreliable. A significant number of pupils have already suffered personal loss. Most have seen their houses destroyed. Yet they still try to study. Their resilience is extraordinary, but it must not be demanded in this way.

In Gaza, what would usually be routine academic practices—tasks, schedules—transform into moral negotiations, influenced daily by anxiety over students’ well-being, comfort and ability to find refuge.

When the storm rages, I cannot help but wonder about them. Do they have dryness? Is there heat? 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 scarce and fuel scarce, warmth comes mainly from donning extra clothing and using whatever blankets are left. Even so, cold nights are excruciating. What about those living in tents?

Political Failure

Figures show that over a million people in Gaza exist in makeshift accommodations. Aid supplies, including insulated tents, have been inadequate. During the recent storm, relief groups reported providing plastic sheets, tents and mattresses to thousands of families. In reality, however, this assistance was widely experienced as patchy and insufficient, limited to temporary solutions that did little against prolonged exposure to cold, wind and rain. Structures give way. Chest infections, hypothermia, and infections linked to damp conditions are rising.

This is not an surprise calamity. Winter is an annual event. People in Gaza understand this failure not as misfortune, but as being forsaken. People speak of how essential materials are blocked or slowed, while attempts to repair damaged homes are frequently blocked. Grassroots projects have tried to find solutions, to provide coverings, yet they are still constrained by what is allowed to enter. The root cause is political and humanitarian. Solutions exist, but are prevented from arriving.

A Preventable Suffering

What makes this suffering especially agonizing is how preventable it is. No one should have to study, raise children, or combat disease standing ankle-deep in cold water inside a tent. No learner should dread the rain damaging their precious phone. Rain exposes just how fragile life has become. It challenges health worn down by pressure, weariness, and sorrow.

This winter occurs alongside the Christmas season that, for millions, represents warmth, refuge and care for the most vulnerable. In Palestine, that {symbolism