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'We seek action, not sympathy'.

A young student, 12, Khan Younis

For the past two years since I entered a real classroom. Two years since I heard the morning bell at my former school, took my seat and raised my hand during my beloved lesson. Occasionally I still clearly recall the sounds and smells: chalk dust, wooden scraps, joyful sounds in corridors. But my learning place was destroyed; it was struck shortly after the hostilities erupted. My books were burned, and companions perished.

I was in fifth grade on the seventh of October: the concluding day I attended classes. That beginning of the day, air raid sirens blared through the passageways. Some students wept, others clasped palms firmly. Our educator attempted reassurance, but even her tone wavered. I remember hoping for a routine day; instruction, recess, a verse presentation. Instead, that day marked the end of my previous existence.

The war has taken so much. But the hardest loss of all is education, because that is the loss of the future itself.

Now I reside with my guardians, male relatives and female sibling in a crowded shelter in al-Mawasi. The tent walls sway with breezes, keeping neither cold nor heat away. We wait in line for water and food. Energy access is fantasy and privacy doesn’t exist. Hope feels fragile.

At evening, I observe the night lights through the holes of my tent and wonder if my friends see the same sky. Some message me when they are able, expressing they long for education and have retained their former exercise books; like treasures from a lost world. I feel guilty because I’ve misplaced all of mine.

I once envisioned pursuing pedagogy to assist Gaza’s children study, even when life was hard. Now I dream of being a writer – to compose, to speak and to show the world what it signifies to be a child in this region. I want to share our experiences of anxiety and deprivation, but also courage. Because even here, amid death and ruins, our words continue.

When connectivity is available, I endeavor to educate myself digitally. On other occasions, I go to a small tent where aid workers educate us mathematics and language. The sessions are brief – the power fails or the bombing resumes but in those moments, I feel alive. I recall who I was: the young woman who adored mathematics and poetry, who was convinced learning could change the world.

Conflict has claimed innumerable things; our dwellings, schools and kin. I lost my uncle, his wife, and their children. I forfeited my cherished hometown, Rafah, which is only ruins now. But the toughest sacrifice of all is schooling, because it represents the forfeiture of tomorrow.

To the world, I say this: keep our hopes alive. We don’t want pity, we demand measures. Gaza’s children merit books, schools and safety. Education is not optional, it is a fundamental entitlement. The territory is not merely devastation; it is minors who still dream amid unmanned aircraft at evening. It is my story and I will keep drafting, even if all I have left is a fractured utensil and a fragment of ripped sheet.

'Pupils inquire: "Are you alright, educator?"'.

An educator, forty, teacher in al-Bureij camp

I have been educating in this area for a substantial period. First in Khan Younis, then in a different town, and currently in the central camp in the middle of the territory. Prior to hostilities, I used to teach several sets of about 40 students each, nearly 240 young minds eager to learn.

Teaching them was my purpose and joy in existence, and I still recollect the gleam in a student’s eyes when a knowledge was acquired; the sort of occasion every instructor strives for.

I always believed education should be full of life. My teaching space was a zone of recreation, art, and movement. We painted maps, performed past occurrences, and transformed instruction into narratives.

Merriment always permeated the space as curiosity replaced apprehension. Yes, even in earlier times, young residents were always scared. My classroom was a secure location but after 7 October, the situation transformed.

My educational institution became a safe haven for families fleeing the aerial attacks. Soon, it was attacked and entirely ruined. There are almost no learning institutions left standing in this area now. For this period, everything has been abnormal. The hostilities has destroyed every facet of our existence: security, dwellings, educational centers, aspirations. Apprehension and mourning are ever-present realities.

Numerous of my pupils are now lost – children who mentioned dreaming of physicians, painters, and teachers. They were refused even the right to exist. Those who are still here endure hunger, relocation and exhaustion – and however, they still maintain the desire for education.

Sometimes, when the internet permits, I hear from a few of them. They contact asking: “Are you OK, teacher?” We communicate concise phrases, short lessons, minor flashes of interaction amid the disorder. They ask if things will ever go back to normal. I state to them I have no answer.

Throughout the region, instructors, volunteers and organizations try to teach wherever possible: in temporary structures, damaged classrooms, or packed refuges. Education has become an gesture of resistance, a way to say: “Our presence continues.” And as long as we persist in education, we will endure.

A significant number of us are also caregivers. I am a mother of {three|several