Amid a Raging Gale, The Cries of Children in Tents Pierced the Night. This Defines Christmas in Gaza
The time was around 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I returned home in Gaza City. A strong wind was blowing, making it impossible to remain any longer, so I had to walk. At first, it was merely a soft rain, but a short distance later the rain became a downpour. That wasnât surprising. I took shelter by a tent, clapping my hands to fight off the chill. A young boy had positioned himself selling homemade cookies. We shared brief remarks while I stood there, but his attention was elsewhere. I noticed the cookies were loosely wrapped in plastic, already soggy from the drizzle, and I questioned if heâd manage to sell them all before the night ended. The cold seeped into everything.
A Walk Through a Place of Tents
While traversing al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, tents lined both sides of the road. No sounds of conversation came from inside them, merely the din of torrential rain and the moan of the wind. As I hurried on, attempting to avoid the rain, I turned on my mobile phone's torch to illuminate the path. I couldn't stop thinking to those huddled within: What occupies them now? What thoughts fill their minds? What are they experiencing? It was bitterly cold. I envisioned children curled under damp covers, parents moving restlessly to keep them warm.
When I opened the door to my apartment, the icy doorknob served as a quiet but powerful reminder of the hardships endured across Gaza in these brutal winter climate. I walked into my apartment and was overwhelmed by the guilt of having a roof when so many were exposed to the storm.
The Midnight Hour Escalates
In the middle of the night, the storm grew stronger. Outside, plastic sheeting on broken panes sagged and flapped violently, while metal sheets ripped free and crashed to the ground. Above it all came the desperate, terrified shouts of children, shattering the darkness. I felt completely helpless.
Over the past two weeks, the rain has been relentless. Freezing, pouring, and carried by strong winds, it has flooded makeshift homes, inundated temporary settlements and turned bare earth into mud. In other places, this might be called âinclement weatherâ. In Gaza, it is endured in a state of exposure and abandonment.
Al-Arbaâiniya
Palestinians know this time of year as al-Arbaâiniya; the most bitter forty days of winter, commencing 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. Ordinarily, it is weathered through preparation and shelter. This year, 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 far from theoretical. Early on the Sunday before Christmas, recovery efforts retrieved the remains 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 remain missing. These structural failures are not caused by ongoing hostilities, but the outcome of homes compromised after months of bombardment and ultimately defeated by winter rain. Not long ago, an eight-month-old baby girl in Khan Younis passed away from exposure to the cold.
A Life in Tents
Passing by the camp nearest my home, I witnessed the impact up close. Thin plastic sheets strained under the weight of water, mattresses floated and clothes remained wet, incapable of drying. Each step reminded me how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold threatened life and health for countless individuals living in tents and cramped refuges.
The majority of these individuals have already been uprooted, many on multiple occasions. Homes are gone. Neighbourhoods flattened. Winter has descended upon Gaza, but protection from it has not. It has come without proper shelter, in darkness, without heating.
Students in the Storm
As a university lecturer in Gaza, this weather weighs heavily on me. My students are not distant names; they are individuals I know; smart, persistent, but extremely fatigued. Most participate in digital sessions from tents; others from overcrowded shelters where solitude is unattainable and connectivity unreliable. Countless learners have already lost family members. Most have lost their homes. Yet they still try to study. Their perseverance is astounding, but it should not be required in this way.
In Gaza, what would usually be routine academic practicesâprojects, due datesâbecome questions of conscience, influenced daily by concern for studentsâ safety, warmth and access to shelter.
On evenings such as this, I am constantly preoccupied about them. Do they have dryness? Is there heat? Did the wind tear through their shelter during the night? For those remaining in apartments, or what remains of them, there is a lack of heat. With electricity mostly absent and fuel rare, warmth comes mostly via bundling up and using the few bedding items available. Despite this, cold nights are unbearable. What about those living in tents?
Political Failure
Reports indicate that over a million people in Gaza live in shelters. Aid supplies, including insulated tents, have been inadequate. Amid the last tempest, relief groups reported delivering coverings, shelters and sleeping materials to a multitude of people. In reality, however, this assistance was widely experienced as patchy and insufficient, limited to temporary solutions that were largely ineffective against ongoing suffering to cold, wind and rain. Structures give way. Chest infections, hypothermia, and infections associated with damp conditions are rising.
This goes beyond an surprise calamity. Winter is an annual event. People in Gaza view this crisis not as bad luck, but as abandonment. People speak of how essential materials are restricted or delayed, while attempts to fix broken houses are frequently blocked. Grassroots projects have tried to improvise, to provide coverings, yet they continue to be hampered by what is allowed to enter. The root cause is political and humanitarian. Solutions exist, but are prevented from arriving.
An Unnecessary Pain
The aspect that renders this pain especially agonizing is how preventable it is. No individual ought to study, raise children, or fight illness standing knee-high in cold water inside a tent. It is wrong for a pupil to worry about the rain destroying their final textbook. Rain reveals just how fragile life has become. It tests bodies worn down by stress, exhaustion, and grief.
This year's chill coincides with the Christmas season that, for millions, symbolises warmth, refuge and care for the most vulnerable. In Palestine, that {symbolism
