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'We don’t want pity, we want action'.

A young student, twelve, a temporary shelter

It has been 24 months since I stepped into a real classroom. Two years since I heard the morning bell at the institution I attended, took my seat and participated actively during my beloved lesson. Sometimes I still clearly recall the familiar scents and noises: powder from the board, wooden scraps, laughter echoing down the halls. But my school no longer exists; it was bombed shortly after the hostilities erupted. My books were burned, and companions perished.

I was in elementary level on 7 October: the final day I entered the school building. That early hours, warning alarms screamed through the halls. Some children cried, others clasped palms firmly. Our teacher tried to calm us, but even her tone wavered. I remember hoping for a routine day; lessons, intermission, a poem recital. Instead, that day became the last page of my old life.

Hostilities have claimed innumerable aspects. But the toughest sacrifice of all is learning, because it represents the forfeiture of tomorrow.

Now I dwell alongside my guardians, male relatives and female sibling in a congested safe space in this coastal area. The temporary partitions flap in the wind, providing no climate control. We wait in line for sustenance and drinks. Electricity is a dream and personal space is absent. Hope feels fragile.

At evening, I look up at the night lights through the openings of my tent and ponder if my peers see the comparable vista. Some contact me when they manage, expressing they yearn for classes and have kept their previous journals; like valuables from a bygone era. I feel guilty because I’ve lost all of mine.

I once dreamed of entering the education field to help young residents learn, even when circumstances were difficult. Now I aim for being a journalist – to write, to talk and to show the world what it represents to be a child in the Strip. I want to tell our stories of fear and hunger, but also fortitude. Because even in this place, amid loss and destruction, our voices refuse to be silent.

When connectivity is available, I try to study via the web. Other times, I visit a small tent where volunteers educate us math and Arabic. The instruction is limited – the power fails or the attacks recommence but in these instances, I feel alive. I remember who I was: the young woman who adored mathematics and poetry, who thought learning could change the world.

Conflict has claimed innumerable things; our homes, educational institutions and relatives. I lost my family member, his spouse, and their offspring. I said goodbye to my cherished hometown, my previous home, which is nothing but rubble now. But the toughest sacrifice of all is schooling, because that is the loss of the future itself.

To the world, I say this: don’t let our dreams die. We seek no sympathy, we want action. Gaza’s children deserve books, schools and security. Schooling is not optional, it is a fundamental entitlement. The territory is not merely devastation; it is children who persist in hoping amid unmanned aircraft at night. It is my narrative and I will persist in composing, even if all I have left is a broken pencil and a scrap of damaged material.

'They message: "are you OK, teacher?"'.

Naglaa Weshah, forty, instructor in a refugee camp

I have been educating in the region for a substantial period. First in that urban area, then in Deir al-Balah, and currently in al-Bureij camp in the heart of the region. In pre-conflict times, I used to teach multiple groups of about fourty pupils per class, nearly 240 young minds enthusiastic about knowledge.

Instructing them was my purpose and joy in reality, and I still recollect the gleam in a student’s eyes when a knowledge was acquired; the sort of occasion every teacher cherishes.

I always was convinced instruction should be dynamic. My teaching space was a zone of amusement, creativity, and motion. We painted maps, performed past occurrences, and transformed instruction into narratives.

Merriment always occupied the area as interest substituted anxiety. Certainly, even before the war, local youth were always frightened. My classroom was a protected zone but after that day, everything changed.

My educational institution became a shelter for households running from the aerial attacks. Soon, it was struck and completely destroyed. There are hardly any learning institutions remaining intact in Gaza now. For two years, nothing has been normal. The war has broken every part of our existence: protection, dwellings, educational centers, dreams. Apprehension and mourning are ever-present realities.

Many of my pupils are now dead – children who talked about dreaming of doctors, artists, and instructors. They were denied even the right to exist. Those who remain live with starvation, relocation and weariness – and however, they still cling to the desire for education.

At times, when the internet allows, I hear from a handful of them. They write inquiring: “Are you OK, instructor?” We communicate short messages, short lessons, tiny sparks of contact amid the chaos. They question if things will ever return to usual. I state to them I am uncertain.

Throughout this territory, educators, helpers and organizations endeavor education in all available spaces: in temporary structures, ruined educational areas, or crowded shelters. Learning has become an gesture of resistance, a way to say: “We persist.” And provided that we persist in education, we will remain.

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