Amid a Raging Tempest, The Cries of Children in Tents Pierced the Night. This Defines Christmas in Gaza

The clock read approximately 8:30 PM on a weekday evening when I made my way home in Gaza City. Gusts of wind blew, making it impossible to remain any longer, leaving me to walk. At first, it was just a gentle sprinkle, but after about 200 metres the rain intensified abruptly. It came as no shock. I paused beside a tent, trying to warm my hands to fight off the chill. A young boy was sitting outside selling sweet treats. We spoke briefly as I waited, but his attention was elsewhere. I observed the cookies were loosely wrapped in plastic, already soggy from the drizzle, and I wondered if he’d find buyers before the night ended. The cold seeped into everything.

A Walk Through a Place of Tents

Walking down al-Wehda Street in Gaza City, canvas structures flanked both sides of the road. There were no voices from inside them, merely the din of rain pouring down and the roar of the wind. As I hurried on, attempting to avoid the rain, I switched on my mobile phone's torch to illuminate the path. My thoughts kept returning to those huddled within: What occupies them now? What thoughts fill their minds? What are they experiencing? A severe chill gripped the air. I imagined children curled under soaked bedding, parents shifting constantly to keep them warm.

As I unlocked the door to my apartment, the icy doorknob served as a subtle yet haunting reminder of the hardships endured across Gaza in these severe cold season. I stepped inside my apartment and was overwhelmed by the guilt of having a roof when so many were exposed to the storm.

The Darkness Intensifies

In the middle of the night, the storm grew stronger. Outside, tarps on damaged glass whipped and strained, while corrugated metal broke away and slammed down. Cutting through the chaos came the desperate, terrified shouts of children, piercing the darkness. I felt utterly powerless.

For the last fortnight, the rain has been relentless. Cold, heavy, and driven by strong winds, it has flooded makeshift homes, swamped refugee areas and turned the soil into mud. In different contexts, this might be called “bad 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 most bitter forty days of winter, beginning 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 weathered through preparation and shelter. Now, Gaza has no such defenses. The frost seeps through homes, streets are vacant and people simply endure.

But the threat posed by the cold is far from theoretical. On the Sunday morning before Christmas, civil defense teams retrieved the remains of two children after the roof of a war-damaged building 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 consequence of homes damaged from months of bombardment and ultimately defeated by winter rain. In recent days, an eight-month-old baby girl in Khan Younis died of exposure to the cold.

A Life in Tents

Walking past the camp nearest my home, I witnessed the impact up close. Inadequate coverings strained under the weight of water, mattresses bobbed in water and clothes remained wet, incapable of drying. Each step reinforced how vulnerable these tents are and how close the rain and cold came to taking life and health for a vast population living in tents and overcrowded shelters.

A great number of these residents have already been displaced, many several times over. Homes are destroyed. Neighbourhoods leveled. Winter has come to Gaza, but shelter from its fury has not. It has come devoid of safe refuge, without electricity, without heating.

Students in the Storm

In my role as a professor in Gaza, this weather weighs heavily on me. My students are not mere statistics; 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 intermittent. Many of my students have already experienced bereavement. Most have lost their homes. Yet they still try to study. Their fortitude is remarkable, but it must not be demanded in this way.

In Gaza, what would typically constitute routine academic practices—tasks, schedules—transform into questions of conscience, shaped each day by uncertainty about students’ security, heat and proximity to protection.

On evenings such as this, I cannot help but wonder about them. Is their shelter holding? Do they feel any warmth? Did the wind tear through their shelter during the night? For those remaining 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. Nonetheless, cold nights are unbearable. What, then those living in tents?

Aid and Abandonment

Agencies state that well over a million people in Gaza exist in makeshift accommodations. Relief items, including insulated tents, have been inadequate. Amid the last tempest, relief groups reported distributing plastic sheets, tents and mattresses to thousands of families. In reality, however, this assistance was widely experienced as uneven and inadequate, limited to band-aid measures 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 cannot be described as an unforeseen disaster. Winter comes every year. People in Gaza view this crisis not as bad luck, but as neglect. People speak of how critical supplies are restricted or delayed, while attempts to reinforce weakened structures are repeatedly obstructed. Grassroots projects have tried to improvise, to distribute plastic sheeting, yet they are still constrained by bureaucratic barriers. The root cause is political and humanitarian. Answers are available, but are kept out.

A Symbolic Season

What makes this suffering especially painful is how unnecessary it should be. No individual ought to study, raise children, or battle sickness standing knee-high in cold water inside a tent. No student should fear the rain damaging their precious phone. Rain lays bare just how precarious existence is. It tests bodies worn down by pressure, weariness, and sorrow.

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