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'We don’t want pity, we want action'.

A young student, twelve, a temporary shelter

For the past 24 months since I stepped into a proper school. Two years since I heard the school chime at Khawla Bint al-Azwar school, sat at my desk and participated actively during my favourite class. Occasionally I still clearly recall the sounds and smells: writing residue, wooden scraps, cheerful echoes. But my educational institution is gone; it was struck shortly after the hostilities erupted. My learning materials incinerated, and some of my friends killed.

I was in fifth grade on the seventh of October: the final day I entered the school building. That early hours, alert signals blared through the halls. Some children cried, others clasped palms firmly. Our instructor sought to soothe, but even she sounded shaky. I remember hoping for a normal day; instruction, intermission, a verse presentation. Instead, that day marked the end of my former reality.

Hostilities have claimed innumerable aspects. But the hardest loss of all is education, because it represents the forfeiture of tomorrow.

Now I dwell alongside my mother and father, two brothers and female sibling in a congested safe space in Khan Younis. The shelter coverings sway with breezes, failing to insulate. We wait in line for nourishment and hydration. Energy access is fantasy and privacy doesn’t exist. Aspiration appears brittle.

At night, I observe the stars through the holes of my temporary home and question if my peers see the identical heavens. Some reach out when they manage, stating they long for education and have kept their old notebooks; 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 assist Gaza’s children study, even when existence was challenging. Now I dream of being a writer – to draft, to speak and to reveal the world what it signifies to be a child in this region. I want to share our experiences of fear and hunger, but also bravery. Because even amid these conditions, amid fatality and debris, our words continue.

When online access exists, I endeavor to educate myself digitally. Other times, I visit a modest shelter where aid workers educate us mathematics and language. The instruction is limited – the power fails or the attacks recommence but in such times, I sense being. I recall who I was: the girl who loved numbers and poems, who was convinced education could transform society.

The war has taken so much; our homes, educational institutions and families. I mourned my paternal relative, his partner, and their young ones. I lost my beautiful city, Rafah, which is only ruins now. But the most painful deprivation of all is schooling, because that is the loss of the future itself.

To the world, I state this: keep our hopes alive. We seek no sympathy, we want action. The youth merit books, schools and security. Schooling is not optional, it is a essential privilege. This region is not merely devastation; it is minors who still dream beneath the drones at darkness. It is my narrative and I will continue writing, even if all I have left is a broken pencil and a piece of torn paper.

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

An educator, forty, instructor in al-Bureij camp

I have been teaching in this area for more than a decade. First in that urban area, then in another location, and presently in al-Bureij camp in the middle of the territory. Prior to hostilities, I used to teach multiple groups of about 40 students each, hundreds of eager students keen on education.

Educating them was my purpose and joy in life, and I still recollect the twinkle in a pupil's gaze when a concept was understood; the type of instance every teacher cherishes.

I always believed education should be full of life. My learning environment was a area of amusement, aesthetics, and movement. We designed geographical illustrations, acted out historical events, and turned lessons into stories.

Joy always permeated the space as inquisitiveness replaced fear. Yes, even prior to conflict, children in Gaza were always scared. My classroom was a protected zone but after 7 October, the situation transformed.

My educational institution became a refuge for families escaping the explosives. Not long later, it was struck and completely destroyed. There are very few learning institutions still erect in this area now. For two years, nothing has been normal. The war has destroyed every part of our existence: safety, homes, educational centers, dreams. Fear and grief are perpetual experiences.

Many of my pupils are now deceased – youth who talked about aspiring to be doctors, creatives, and educators. They were deprived even the entitlement to survival. Those who remain live with hunger, displacement and fatigue – and however, they still hold onto the thirst for knowledge.

Sometimes, when the connectivity permits, I get in touch with a small number of them. They write questioning: “How are you, educator?” We communicate short messages, short lessons, minor flashes of contact amid the turmoil. They inquire if things will ever go back to normal. I inform them I don’t know.

Throughout this territory, educators, helpers and organizations try to teach in all available spaces: in temporary structures, damaged classrooms, or packed refuges. Learning has become an gesture of resistance, a way to express: “We persist.” And so long as we continue learning, we will endure.

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