In the midst of a Fierce Storm, The Cries of Children in Tents Pierced the Night. This Marks Christmas in Gaza

The clock read around 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. At first, it was only a light drizzle, but a short distance later the rain intensified abruptly. That wasn’t surprising. I paused beside a tent, clapping my hands to draw some warmth. A young boy had positioned himself selling baked goods. We exchanged a few words while I stood there, but his attention was elsewhere. I saw the cookies were poorly packaged in plastic, already soggy from the drizzle, and I pondered if he’d find buyers before the night ended. A deep chill permeated the air.

A Journey Through a City of Tents

While traversing al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, canvas structures flanked both sides of the road. An eerie silence replaced voices from inside them, merely the din of rain pouring down and the moan of the wind. Quickening my pace, attempting to avoid the rain, I turned on my mobile phone's torch to light my way. My thoughts kept returning to those sheltering inside: How are they passing the time now? What thoughts fill their minds? What are they experiencing? It was bitterly cold. I pictured children curled under soaked bedding, parents shifting constantly to keep them warm.

Upon opening the door to my apartment, the icy doorknob served as a quiet but powerful reminder of the suffering faced across Gaza in these brutal winter climate. I walked into my apartment and couldn't shake the guilt of possessing shelter when a multitude remained unprotected to the storm.

The Midnight Hour Intensifies

As midnight passed, the storm grew stronger. Outside, makeshift covers on shattered windows billowed and tore, while metal sheets ripped free and slammed down. Above it all came the piercing, fearful cries of children, shattering the darkness. I felt completely helpless.

For the last fortnight, the rain has been relentless. Freezing, pouring, and carried by strong winds, it has soaked tents, inundated temporary settlements and turned the soil into mud. In different contexts, this might be called “bad weather”. In Gaza, it is lived with exposure and abandonment.

Al-Arba’iniya

Palestinians know this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the fourty most severe days of winter, commencing in late December and lasting until the end of January. It is the real onset of winter, the moment when the season unleashes its intensity. Ordinarily, it is endured with preparation and shelter. Currently, Gaza has no such defenses. The cold bites through homes, streets are vacant and people merely survive.

But the threat posed by the cold is no longer abstract. Early on the Sunday before Christmas, recovery efforts found the victims of two children after the roof of a shelled home collapsed in northern Gaza, rescuing five others, including a child and two women. Two people are still unaccounted for. These incidents are not caused by ongoing hostilities, but the consequence of homes weakened by months of bombardment and succumbing to winter rain. In recent days, an infant in Khan Younis passed away from exposure to the cold.

Precarious Existence

Walking past the camp nearest my home, I witnessed the impact up close. Flimsy tarpaulins buckled beneath the weight of water, mattresses floated and clothes remained wet, always damp. Each step reminded me how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold came to taking life and health for countless individuals living in tents and packed sanctuaries.

Most of these people have already been uprooted, many several times over. Homes are lost. Neighbourhoods flattened. Winter has descended upon Gaza, but defense against it has not. It has come lacking adequate housing, in darkness, without heating.

The Weight on Education

In my role as a professor in Gaza, this weather causes deep concern. My students are not figures in a report; they are individuals I know; intelligent, determined, but profoundly exhausted. Most attend online classes from tents; others from overcrowded shelters where personal space doesn't exist and connectivity sporadic. A significant number of pupils have already experienced bereavement. Most have been rendered homeless. Yet they persist in learning. Their fortitude is remarkable, but it must not be demanded in this way.

In Gaza, what would typically constitute routine academic practices—assignments, deadlines—transform into moral negotiations, influenced daily by uncertainty about students’ security, heat and proximity to protection.

During nights like these, I find myself thinking about them. Is their shelter holding? Are they warm? Could the storm have shredded through their shelter while they were trying to sleep? For those residing in apartments, or what remains of them, there is a lack of heat. With electricity mostly absent and fuel scarce, warmth comes primarily through bundling up and using whatever blankets are left. Nonetheless, cold nights are excruciating. How then those living in tents?

Political Failure

Agencies state that more than a million people in Gaza reside in temporary housing. Humanitarian assistance, including insulated tents, have been insufficient. Amid the last tempest, relief groups reported delivering tarpaulins, tents and bedding to a multitude of people. In reality, however, this assistance was often perceived as uneven and inadequate, limited to band-aid measures that offered scant protection against extended hardship to cold, wind and rain. Tents collapse. Sicknesses, hypothermia, and infections caused by damp conditions are on the upswing.

This is not an unforeseen disaster. Winter is an annual event. People in Gaza understand this failure not as misfortune, but as neglect. People speak of how essential materials are hindered or postponed, while attempts to fix broken houses are frequently blocked. Community efforts have tried to improvise, to hand out tarps, yet they are still constrained by bureaucratic barriers. The failure is political and humanitarian. Answers are available, but are kept out.

An Unnecessary Pain

The factor that intensifies this hardship especially heartbreaking is how unnecessary it should be. No individual ought to study, raise children, or fight illness standing ankle-deep in cold water inside a tent. No student should fear the rain damaging their precious phone. Rain reveals just how vulnerable survival is. It challenges health worn down by anxiety, fatigue, and loss.

This winter aligns with the Christmas season that, for millions, symbolises warmth, refuge and care for the neediest. In Palestine, that {symbolism