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'We don’t want pity, we want action'.

Juwayriya Adwan, 12, a temporary shelter

For the past 24 months since I entered a proper school. Two years since I listened to the morning bell at Khawla Bint al-Azwar school, occupied my place and raised my hand during my preferred subject. Sometimes I still vividly remember the auditory and olfactory sensations: writing residue, pencil shavings, laughter echoing down the halls. But my learning place was destroyed; it was struck not long after the hostilities erupted. My textbooks turned to ash, and several classmates lost.

I was in fifth grade on the seventh of October: the last day I entered the school building. That beginning of the day, air raid sirens blared through the halls. Some children cried, others clasped palms firmly. Our teacher tried to calm us, but even her voice trembled. I remember hoping for a ordinary day; teaching, intermission, a verse presentation. Instead, that day marked the end of my old life.

The war has taken so much. But the toughest sacrifice of all is schooling, because without it, our prospects disappear.

Now I live with my guardians, siblings and sister in a packed refuge in this coastal area. The temporary partitions sway with breezes, providing no climate control. We queue for water and food. Power is imaginary and seclusion is unavailable. Aspiration appears brittle.

At evening, I look up at the stars through the gaps of my temporary home and ponder if my peers see the comparable vista. Some reach out when they can, expressing they miss school and have preserved their previous journals; like treasures from a lost world. I feel guilty because I’ve forfeited all of mine.

I once envisioned becoming a teacher to help Gaza’s children acquire knowledge, even when circumstances were difficult. Now I dream of being a journalist – to write, to speak and to show the world what it means to be a minor in Gaza. I want to share our experiences of anxiety and deprivation, but also fortitude. Because even here, amid loss and destruction, our expressions persist.

When online access exists, I endeavor to educate myself online. On other occasions, I visit a modest shelter where aid workers instruct us arithmetic and Arabic. The lessons are short – the energy supply stops or the airstrikes begin again but in those moments, I sense being. I remember who I was: the girl who adored mathematics and poetry, who thought education could transform society.

Hostilities have stolen countless aspects; our dwellings, educational institutions and families. I lost my family member, his spouse, and their young ones. I lost my cherished hometown, Rafah, which is only ruins now. But the hardest loss of all is education, because it represents the forfeiture of tomorrow.

To the world, I state this: don’t let our dreams die. Compassion isn't enough, we want action. Young residents merit texts, educational facilities and protection. Learning is not an extravagance, it is a fundamental entitlement. This region is not just ruins; it is minors who persist in hoping beneath the drones at night. It is my narrative and I will keep drafting, even if my only possessions is a damaged writing tool and a fragment of ripped sheet.

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

An educator, forty, teacher in central Gaza

I have been educating in the region for over ten years. Originally in a southern city, then in Deir al-Balah, and currently in the central camp in the central Gaza Strip. Prior to hostilities, I regularly instructed multiple groups of about 40 students each, almost two hundred forty individuals eager to learn.

Teaching them was my purpose and joy in reality, and I still remember the sparkle in a student’s eyes when a knowledge was acquired; the type of instance every teacher lives for.

I always was convinced education should be vibrant. My learning environment was a area of amusement, creativity, and movement. We painted maps, acted out historical events, and transformed instruction into narratives.

Merriment always occupied the area as interest displaced anxiety. Indeed, even prior to conflict, children in Gaza were always frightened. My classroom was a protected zone but after that day, all was altered.

My school became a safe haven for relatives escaping the explosives. Soon, it was targeted and entirely ruined. There are very few educational facilities left standing in this area now. For this period, nothing has been normal. The hostilities has shattered every aspect of our lives: safety, residences, educational centers, aspirations. Fear and grief are perpetual experiences.

Many of my students are now deceased – children who mentioned becoming medical professionals, painters, and educators. They were denied even the privilege of living. Those who are still here live with malnutrition, relocation and exhaustion – and however, they still maintain the will to learn.

At times, when the internet permits, I get in touch with a small number of them. They write inquiring: “Are you OK, teacher?” We communicate concise phrases, short lessons, small glimmers of connection amid the turmoil. They ask if situations will ever go back to normal. I state to them I don’t know.

All over the region, teachers, helpers and non-profits endeavor education in all available spaces: in temporary structures, destroyed learning spaces, or crowded shelters. Schooling has become an gesture of resistance, a way to express: “We persist.” And provided that we keep acquiring knowledge, we will persist.

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