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'We seek action, not sympathy'.

Juwayriya Adwan, twelve, a temporary shelter

It has been two years since I entered a proper school. Two years since I heard the start-of-class signal at my former school, occupied my place and answered questions during my favourite class. At times I still clearly recall the familiar scents and noises: chalk dust, pencil shavings, cheerful echoes. But my school no longer exists; it was bombed not long after the war began. My learning materials incinerated, and companions perished.

I was in the fifth year on 7 October: the final day I attended classes. That early hours, air raid sirens sounded through the halls. Some students wept, others gripped each other. Our teacher tried to calm us, but even her tone wavered. I remember hoping for a normal day; lessons, break time, a poem recital. Instead, that day signaled the conclusion 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 dwell alongside my parents, male relatives and female sibling in a packed refuge in this coastal area. The shelter coverings flap in the wind, keeping neither cold nor heat away. We line up for sustenance and drinks. Energy access is fantasy and privacy doesn’t exist. Hope feels fragile.

At darkness, I look up at the celestial bodies through the gaps of my shelter and ponder if my companions see the comparable vista. Some reach out when they manage, stating they long for education and have preserved their old notebooks; like treasures from a lost world. I feel remorseful because I’ve misplaced all of mine.

I once aspired to pursuing pedagogy to support young residents learn, even when existence was challenging. Now I aim for being a writer – to compose, to talk and to show the world what it represents to be a young person in Gaza. I want to narrate our accounts of anxiety and deprivation, but also courage. Because even here, amid loss and destruction, our voices refuse to be silent.

When online access exists, I endeavor to educate myself via the web. Other times, I visit a modest shelter where helpers educate us mathematics and language. The instruction is limited – the power fails or the attacks recommence but in these instances, I feel alive. I recall who I was: the girl who cherished arithmetic and verse, who thought education could transform society.

Hostilities have stolen countless aspects; our residences, learning centers and kin. I mourned my paternal relative, his partner, and their offspring. I lost my cherished hometown, Rafah, which is merely debris now. But the hardest loss of all is schooling, because that is the loss of the future itself.

To the global audience, I state this: preserve our aspirations. We seek no sympathy, we require steps. Gaza’s children merit texts, educational facilities and security. Schooling is not an extravagance, it is a essential privilege. Gaza is not merely devastation; it is youth who persist in hoping amid unmanned aircraft at evening. It is my narrative and I will continue writing, even if the sole items remaining is a fractured utensil and a fragment of ripped sheet.

'Students ask: "Teacher, are you safe?"'.

An educator, forty, teacher in al-Bureij camp

I have been instructing in Gaza for over ten years. First in a southern city, then in Deir al-Balah, and presently in the central camp in the central Gaza Strip. Before the war started, I used to teach multiple groups of about 40 students each, hundreds of eager students eager to learn.

Teaching them was my purpose and joy in existence, and I still remember the sparkle in a student’s eyes when a concept was understood; the type of instance every teacher cherishes.

I always believed learning should be dynamic. My teaching space was a space of amusement, art, and movement. We created cartographic art, acted out historical events, and transformed instruction into narratives.

Merriment always occupied the area as inquisitiveness substituted anxiety. Certainly, even before the war, children in Gaza were always afraid. My teaching space was a place of safety but after that day, the situation transformed.

My school became a shelter for households fleeing the explosives. Shortly after, it was struck and completely destroyed. There are almost no schools left standing in this area now. For this period, nothing has been normal. The war has destroyed every facet of our existence: security, dwellings, schools, hopes. Apprehension and mourning are perpetual experiences.

A significant number of my pupils are now deceased – children who talked about becoming medical professionals, painters, and educators. They were refused even the right to exist. Those who are still here experience starvation, eviction and weariness – and nevertheless, they still cling to the desire for education.

Sometimes, when the internet enables, I receive messages from a small number of them. They write questioning: “Are you safe, educator?” We exchange concise phrases, short lessons, tiny sparks of connection amid the disorder. They ask if situations will ever return to usual. I state to them I don’t know.

Throughout this territory, teachers, volunteers and organizations endeavor education in all available spaces: in tents, damaged classrooms, or crowded shelters. Schooling has become an demonstration of perseverance, a way to express: “We persist.” And as long as we keep acquiring knowledge, we will persist.

Numerous of us are also parents. I am a parent of {three|several