From Warmth to Desolation: A Gazan Winter Transformed
For graduate Khaled Al-Qershali, writing from Gaza, winter once represented the pinnacle of comfort and childhood joy. He recalls black clouds gathering and raindrops falling as the signal for his family to congregate at his grandparents' house. He would sit beside his grandfather by the fire while his grandmother warmed the teapot. For them, winter was a season where they never felt the cold.
His days were filled with running barefoot through puddles with his cousins, playing ghommemeh – hide-and-seek – as the rain soaked them. His nights were spent listening to his grandfather's tales of 1960s travels. As he grew older, winter became a time for meeting friends like Mahmoud and the late Mohammed Hamo, making tea over firewood, playing cards, and discussing their futures.
The Invasion That Shattered a Season
The Israeli invasion of Gaza in October 2023 destroyed every positive association Al-Qershali held with winter. His family was evacuated on 13 October without bedding or winter clothes. They eventually purchased blankets at around $35 each, with Al-Qershali and his younger brother sharing just one. A few weeks later, sleeping in a school backyard, he woke up shivering to find his blanket drenched by soft rains. "I have hated winter since that day," he writes.
Thousands of families share this experience. Ismail Abed, 19, lived with his 14-member family in a makeshift tent of sewn-together blankets, waking repeatedly soaked. "We were drowning whenever it rained," Ismail said, until they received a tent from UNRWA, which they shared with another homeless family. The new tent offered some protection from rain, but the biting cold wind and lack of sufficient blankets remained unbearable.
A Daily Struggle for Basic Survival
In their own crowded tent, there was no space to light a fire for warmth. Cooking became immensely difficult. The Israeli occupation prevented cooking gas from entering the Strip, and their uncovered cooking fire was extinguished by rain. Without a refrigerator, they shopped for food daily, sometimes walking for two hours in the rain to fetch essentials like flour or rice, all while contending with rats and cockroaches.
Mohammed Abu Al-Mehza, displaced in northern Gaza, recounted his family's evacuation from Al-Shati camp to Al-Sheikh Redwaan neighbourhood in December 2023, walking on foot in the rain. "All my family, including me, was sick the next day," he said, an illness that lasted over ten days due to scarce medicine.
Osama Adas, 23, evacuated to southern Gaza with his family, setting up a tent 20 metres from the sea where the coastal wind was brutally cold. After a ceasefire, he returned north to find his four-story building destroyed. Forced back south, his family remains displaced in a tent in Al-Mashaala area, eastern Deir Al-Ballah. "I do not know how I will survive this winter," Osama confessed. "The heavy rains have not arrived yet, but even so, rain is already falling inside the tent."
Al-Qershali now prays for the season to end. Winter, once a time of warmth, laughter, and fleeting beauty marked by migratory birds painting the sky, has become a story of resilience. It is a narrative of lives uprooted, survival against all odds, and a fragile hope that one day, Gaza’s children will again run barefoot in the rain without fear.
