🔗 Share this article

'We seek action, not sympathy'.

A young student, 12, a temporary shelter

It has been 24 months since I stepped into a real classroom. Two years since I listened to the start-of-class signal at my former school, sat at my desk and raised my hand during my favourite class. At times I still clearly recall the familiar scents and noises: chalk dust, wooden scraps, cheerful echoes. But my learning place was destroyed; it was struck soon after the war began. My learning materials incinerated, and companions perished.

I was in the fifth year on that fateful day: the concluding day I entered the school building. That morning, air raid sirens blared through the corridors. Some children cried, others gripped each other. Our instructor sought to soothe, but even her voice trembled. I remember hoping for a normal day; lessons, break time, 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 that is the loss of the future itself.

Now I reside with my parents, two brothers and sister in a congested safe space in Khan Younis. The tent walls move with air currents, failing to insulate. We queue for water and food. Power is imaginary and privacy doesn’t exist. Aspiration appears brittle.

At night, I look up at the night lights through the openings of my tent and wonder if my peers see the same sky. Some reach out when they can, saying they miss school and have kept their former exercise books; like valuables from a bygone era. I feel remorseful because I’ve forfeited all of mine.

I once dreamed of entering the education field to assist young residents acquire knowledge, even when existence was challenging. Now I aim for being a writer – to compose, to communicate and to reveal the world what it means to be a minor in the Strip. I want to tell our stories of fear and hunger, but also bravery. Because even amid these conditions, amid loss and destruction, our voices refuse to be silent.

When online access exists, I endeavor to educate myself online. On other occasions, I go to a tiny space where helpers educate us arithmetic and Arabic. The lessons are short – the energy supply stops or the bombing resumes but in such times, I feel alive. I recall who I was: the girl who cherished arithmetic and verse, who thought education could transform society.

Conflict has claimed innumerable things; our homes, learning centers and kin. I mourned my family member, his wife, and their young ones. I lost my beloved urban area, my previous home, which is only ruins now. But the most painful deprivation of all is education, because that is the loss of the future itself.

To the world, I state this: preserve our aspirations. We don’t want pity, we demand measures. Young residents merit books, schools and safety. Learning is not an extravagance, it is a fundamental entitlement. Gaza is not just ruins; it is minors who persist in hoping amid unmanned aircraft at night. It is my narrative and I will continue writing, even if my only possessions is a damaged writing tool and a fragment of ripped sheet.

'Pupils inquire: "Are you alright, educator?"'.

An educator, 40, teacher in a refugee camp

I have been teaching in the region for more than a decade. Initially in Khan Younis, then in Deir al-Balah, and presently in the central camp in the middle of the territory. In pre-conflict times, I typically educated multiple groups of about 40 students each, hundreds of eager students keen on education.

Educating them was my mission and happiness in life, and I still remember the twinkle in a pupil's gaze when a new idea clicked; the sort of occasion every teacher strives for.

I always thought instruction should be dynamic. My classroom was a space of amusement, aesthetics, and movement. We designed geographical illustrations, performed past occurrences, and converted teaching into tales.

Laughter always filled the room as inquisitiveness replaced anxiety. Indeed, even prior to conflict, young residents were always afraid. My learning environment was a protected zone but after 7 October, everything changed.

My learning center became a shelter for families running from the aerial attacks. Soon, it was struck and entirely ruined. There are almost no educational facilities still erect in Gaza now. For this period, all has been unusual. The war has shattered every part of our reality: safety, dwellings, schools, dreams. Fear and grief are ever-present realities.

A significant number of my students are now dead – minors who spoke of dreaming of doctors, artists, and educators. They were deprived even the right to exist. Those who remain live with malnutrition, displacement and exhaustion – and nevertheless, they still hold onto the thirst for knowledge.

At times, when the internet enables, I receive messages from a small number of them. They message inquiring: “How are you, teacher?” We communicate brief words, miniature instruction, minor flashes of contact amid the turmoil. They ask if circumstances will ever revert to standard. I tell them I don’t know.

Throughout Gaza, educators, volunteers and organizations attempt instruction in all available spaces: in shelters, ruined educational areas, or congested safe zones. Education has become an act of defiance, a way to say: “We are still here.” And so long as we persist in education, we will remain.

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