DaysofPal- As winter approaches, hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians in Gaza are bracing for freezing temperatures and heavy rains, without adequate shelter, heating, or protection.
For many, this will be their third consecutive winter spent in tattered tents, a grim reminder of the destruction and displacement caused by years of Israeli genocidal bombardment.
Across Gaza, public squares, beaches, sports fields, and makeshift shelters have been transformed into sprawling tent camps, where the displaced live in dire conditions, surrounded by mud, sewage, and the constant fear of flooding as the Strip’s shattered infrastructure fails to drain rainwater.
Amal al-Gharabli, an elderly woman with a leg injury, sits outside her worn-out tent in a central Gaza shelter.
Clutching her walking aid, she looks anxiously at the gray sky.
She said, “Last winter, our tent flooded. Now I’m injured, and the cold makes the pain unbearable. I’m terrified it will happen again.”
Nearby, Umm Imad al-Harkali lives in another dilapidated tent patched with torn blankets. “Winter used to mean blessing,” she says, adding, “but for us, it’s fear and misery. My tent is collapsing, and I can’t afford to buy plastic sheets to cover it. If it rains, we’ll drown.”
On Gaza’s western coast, hundreds of families have pitched tents along the fishermen’s wharf, hemmed in by seawater on both sides. Ahmad, a father of four, describes their nights as “a nightmare of wind and waves.”
His children shiver through the night as rain seeps through the canvas roof, saying, “We feel like the sea will swallow us.”
A few meters away, Safaa al-Balawi struggles to assemble a makeshift tent before the next storm. Her home was destroyed in the latest Israeli offensive.
Holding her three-month-old baby, who suffers from bronchitis, she says softly: “I have nowhere safe to keep my baby warm. No shelter, no protection, only this harsh cold and fear.”
In central Gaza, Ayman Rayhan looks up at the dark clouds forming over his flimsy tent made of fabric. “Winter has become a nightmare,” he says.
“These tents aren’t made for living. This is our third year inside them, heat kills us in summer, and the cold eats us alive in winter.” He added.
The humanitarian crisis deepens as Gaza’s damaged sewage and drainage systems collapse under the first rains, whereas streets turn into swamps of mud and wastewater.
“With just one rainfall, this area becomes a health disaster,” says Suhib Abu Asi, a shop worker near al-Sahaba Street.
“You can’t even walk through the filth.” He added.
Municipal officials warn that the situation is critical, where Eng. Maher Salem, Gaza’s Director of Planning, says over a quarter of the city’s stormwater network has been destroyed, and sewage reservoirs are already overflowing.
“Most tents are in low-lying areas, vulnerable to floods and contamination, without equipment, fuel, or pumps. Preventing a disaster this winter is nearly impossible,” he explains.
For Gaza’s displaced, survival has become an endurance test, a struggle against hunger, illness, and the elements.
As one resident put it, “We no longer fear the rain itself, but what it reveals, the world’s silence as we face another winter with nothing but torn tents and fading hope.” He said.
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