During a Raging Gale, I Could Hear. This is Christmas in Gaza
The clock read approximately 8:30 PM on a Thursday when I headed back home in Gaza City. Gusts of wind blew, and I couldn’t stay out any longer, so I had to walk. Initially, it was merely a soft rain, but following a brief walk the rain intensified abruptly. That wasn’t surprising. I took shelter by a tent, clapping my hands to generate a little heat. A young boy sat nearby selling sweet treats. We exchanged a few words during my pause, but his attention was elsewhere. I saw the cookies were hastily covered in plastic, dampened from the drizzle, and I questioned if he’d manage to sell them all before the night ended. The cold seeped into everything.
A Journey Through a City 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, only the sound of rain pouring down and the roar of the wind. Quickening my pace, trying to dodge the rain, I turned on my mobile phone's torch to illuminate the path. My thoughts kept returning to those taking refuge within: What are they doing now? What is their state of mind? What emotions do they hold? The cold was piercing. I envisioned children huddled under soaked bedding, parents shifting constantly to keep them warm.
Upon opening the door to my apartment, the freezing handle served as a quiet but powerful reminder of the hardships endured across Gaza in these brutal winter climate. I stepped inside my apartment and was overwhelmed by the guilt of having a roof when so many were exposed to the storm.
The Midnight Hour Worsens
In the middle of the night, the storm grew stronger. Outside, makeshift covers on shattered windows whipped and strained, while corrugated metal tore loose and fell with a clatter. Cutting through the chaos came the sharp, panicked screams of children, piercing the darkness. I felt utterly powerless.
Over the past two weeks, the rain has been unending. Chilly, dense, and propelled by strong winds, it has flooded makeshift homes, flooded makeshift camps and turned the soil into mud. In other places, this might be called “poor conditions”. In Gaza, it is experienced amidst exposure and abandonment.
Al-Arba’iniya
Residents refer to this time of year as al-Arba’iniya; the most bitter forty days of winter, commencing in late December and continuing through the end of January. It is the definite start of winter, the moment when the season unleashes its intensity. Normally, it is endured with preparation and shelter. Now, Gaza has none of these. The frost seeps through homes, streets are deserted and people merely survive.
But the threat posed by the cold is now very real. Early on the Sunday before Christmas, rescue operations recovered the bodies of two children after the roof of a bombarded structure collapsed in northern Gaza, freeing five additional individuals, including a child and two women. Two people have not been found. These incidents are not the result of fresh strikes, but the result 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 succumbed to exposure to the cold.
A Life in Tents
Walking past the camp nearest my home, I saw the consequences up close. Inadequate coverings buckled beneath the weight of water, mattresses were adrift and clothes were perpetually moist, incapable of drying. Each step reinforced how fragile these shelters were and how close the rain and cold came to claiming life and health for a vast population living in tents and cramped refuges.
The majority of these individuals have already been uprooted, many repeatedly. Homes are lost. Neighbourhoods flattened. Winter has descended upon Gaza, but shelter from its fury has not. It has come without proper shelter, without electricity, devoid of warmth.
A Teacher's Anguish
As a university lecturer in Gaza, this weather is a heavy burden. My students are not mere statistics; they are young people I speak to; smart, persistent, but deeply weary. Most join virtual lessons from tents; others from overcrowded shelters where personal space doesn't exist and connectivity unreliable. A significant number of pupils have already experienced bereavement. Most have seen their houses destroyed. Yet they continue their education. Their fortitude is remarkable, but it should not be required in this way.
In Gaza, what would usually be routine academic practices—tasks, schedules—turn into questions of conscience, shaped each day by anxiety over students’ well-being, comfort and ability to find refuge.
During nights like these, I cannot help but wonder about them. Is their shelter holding? Are they warm? Did the wind tear through their shelter while they were trying to sleep? For those still living in apartments, or damaged structures, there is an absence of warmth. With electricity mostly absent and fuel rare, warmth comes mainly from wearing multiple layers and using whatever blankets are left. Even so, cold nights are intolerable. What, then those living in tents?
The Humanitarian Shortfall
Agencies state that well over a million people in Gaza reside in temporary housing. Aid supplies, including weatherproof shelters, have been insufficient. During the recent storm, relief groups reported distributing plastic sheets, tents and mattresses to numerous households. For those affected, however, this assistance was widely experienced as uneven and inadequate, limited to temporary solutions that were largely ineffective against prolonged exposure to cold, wind and rain. Structures give way. Respiratory illnesses, hypothermia, and infections associated with damp conditions are increasing.
This is not an surprise calamity. 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 repair damaged homes are frequently blocked. Grassroots projects have tried to improvise, to distribute plastic sheeting, yet they continue to be hampered by what is allowed to enter. The culpability lies in political and humanitarian. Solutions exist, but are prevented from arriving.
A Symbolic Season
The aspect that renders this pain especially heartbreaking is how unnecessary it should be. It is unconscionable 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 ruining their last notebook. Rain reveals just how precarious existence is. It strains physiques worn down by anxiety, fatigue, and loss.
The current cold season occurs alongside the Christmas season that, for millions, epitomizes warmth, refuge and care for the most vulnerable. In Palestine, that {symbolism
