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'We don’t want pity, we want action'.

Juwayriya Adwan, twelve, al-Mawasi

It has been two years since I entered a real classroom. That long since I heard the start-of-class signal at my former school, sat at my desk and raised my hand during my beloved lesson. At times I still vividly remember the auditory and olfactory sensations: writing residue, sharpener leftovers, cheerful echoes. But my educational institution is gone; it was bombed not long after the war began. My textbooks turned to ash, and companions perished.

I was in the fifth year on 7 October: the last day I went to school. That early hours, alert signals screamed through the passageways. Some pupils sobbed, others gripped each other. Our educator attempted reassurance, but even her tone wavered. I remember longing for a normal day; lessons, break time, a verse presentation. Instead, that day became the last page of my former reality.

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

Now I live with my mother and father, siblings and sister in a crowded shelter in this coastal area. The temporary partitions flap in the wind, keeping neither cold nor heat away. We wait in line for nourishment and hydration. Energy access is fantasy and personal space is absent. Optimism seems delicate.

At evening, I look up at the night lights through the openings of my shelter and ponder if my friends see the comparable vista. Some reach out when they are able, saying they yearn for classes and have retained their former exercise books; like valuables from a bygone era. I feel remorseful because I’ve misplaced all of mine.

I once dreamed of pursuing pedagogy to support Gaza’s children acquire knowledge, even when life was hard. Now I aim for being a journalist – to write, to speak and to demonstrate the world what it represents to be a child in the Strip. I want to narrate our accounts of apprehension and need, but also courage. Because even in this place, amid loss and destruction, our expressions persist.

When online access exists, I try to study digitally. Sometimes, I attend a small tent where aid workers educate us arithmetic and Arabic. The instruction is limited – the energy supply stops or the attacks recommence but in such times, I feel alive. I remember who I was: the girl who cherished arithmetic and verse, who thought learning could change the world.

Hostilities have stolen countless aspects; our residences, educational institutions and families. I lost my paternal relative, his wife, and their children. I lost my beautiful city, that southern city, which is merely debris now. But the hardest loss of all is schooling, because that is the loss of the future itself.

To the world, I express this: keep our hopes alive. Compassion isn't enough, we demand measures. Gaza’s children deserve texts, learning environments and protection. Education is not an extravagance, it is a basic right. Gaza is not merely devastation; it is youth who still dream under aerial surveillance at darkness. It is my narrative and I will keep drafting, even if my only possessions is a damaged writing tool and a scrap of damaged material.

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

Naglaa Weshah, forty, teacher in al-Bureij camp

I have been instructing in this area for over ten years. Originally in that urban area, then in Deir al-Balah, and currently in this refugee settlement in the heart of the region. Before the war started, I regularly instructed multiple groups of about dozens of learners, hundreds of eager students enthusiastic about knowledge.

Instructing them was my vocation and delight in reality, and I still recollect the gleam in a pupil's gaze when a knowledge was acquired; the kind of moment every instructor cherishes.

I always thought learning should be vibrant. My teaching space was a space of recreation, creativity, and movement. We created cartographic art, dramatized bygone episodes, and transformed instruction into narratives.

Joy always filled the room as interest substituted anxiety. Indeed, even prior to conflict, children in Gaza were always frightened. My teaching space was a secure location but after that day, all was altered.

My learning center became a shelter for relatives fleeing the bombs. Not long later, it was struck and totally demolished. There are almost no schools remaining intact in Gaza now. For 24 months, everything has been abnormal. The hostilities has broken every part of our existence: security, dwellings, learning places, aspirations. Fear and grief are ever-present realities.

Many of my learners are now dead – minors who spoke of aspiring to be physicians, artists, and educators. They were denied even the entitlement to survival. Those who are still here experience starvation, eviction and fatigue – and yet, they still hold onto the desire for education.

Sometimes, when the internet enables, I get in touch with a handful of them. They message inquiring: “Are you safe, educator?” We exchange concise phrases, abbreviated teaching, tiny sparks of interaction amid the chaos. They ask if circumstances will ever revert to standard. I state to them I am uncertain.

All over the region, instructors, helpers and organizations attempt instruction wherever possible: in shelters, damaged classrooms, or congested safe zones. Schooling has become an gesture of resistance, a way to declare: “We persist.” And so long as we persist in education, we will remain.

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