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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 school chime at Khawla Bint al-Azwar school, sat at my desk and participated actively during my beloved lesson. Sometimes I still distinctly recollect the sounds and smells: writing residue, pencil shavings, joyful sounds in corridors. But my educational institution is gone; it was struck shortly after the war began. My books were burned, and several classmates lost.

I was in elementary level on the seventh of October: the final day I entered the school building. That beginning of the day, warning alarms blared through the halls. Some students wept, others held hands tightly. Our instructor sought to soothe, but even her tone wavered. I remember longing for a ordinary day; teaching, recess, a literary performance. Instead, that day became the last page of my previous existence.

Conflict has stolen countless things. But the toughest sacrifice of all is schooling, because without it, our prospects disappear.

Now I reside with my guardians, two brothers and female sibling in a crowded shelter in Khan Younis. The temporary partitions flap in the wind, keeping neither cold nor heat away. We queue for water and food. Electricity is a dream and privacy doesn’t exist. Aspiration appears brittle.

At darkness, I look up at the celestial bodies through the gaps of my shelter and question if my companions see the identical heavens. Some message me when they can, expressing they yearn for classes and have preserved their previous journals; like treasures from a lost world. I feel remorseful because I’ve forfeited all of mine.

I once aspired to pursuing pedagogy to help Gaza’s children learn, even when life was hard. Now I aim for being a reporter – to draft, to speak and to show the world what it signifies to be a young person in Gaza. I want to tell our stories of fear and hunger, but also fortitude. Because even here, amid loss and destruction, our words continue.

When connectivity is available, I endeavor to educate myself digitally. Other times, I attend a modest shelter where volunteers teach us math and Arabic. The lessons are short – the energy supply stops or the attacks recommence but in such times, I sense being. I recollect who I was: the young woman who cherished arithmetic and verse, who believed learning could change the world.

The war has taken so much; our dwellings, learning centers and kin. I grieved for my paternal relative, his spouse, and their young ones. I lost my beloved urban area, that southern city, which is merely debris now. But the most painful deprivation of all is learning, because that is the loss of the future itself.

To the world, I express this: don’t let our dreams die. We don’t want pity, we demand measures. Young residents are entitled to texts, educational facilities and safety. Schooling is not a luxury, it is a basic right. This region is not just ruins; it is youth who continue to aspire amid unmanned aircraft at evening. It is my story and I will continue writing, even if all I have left is a damaged writing tool and a fragment of ripped sheet.

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

An educator, 40, teacher in central Gaza

I have been teaching in Gaza for a substantial period. First in a southern city, then in a different town, and presently in the central camp in the middle of the territory. Prior to hostilities, I regularly instructed six classes of about 40 students each, hundreds of eager students enthusiastic about knowledge.

Instructing them was my purpose and joy in life, and I still recollect the twinkle in a learner's look when a new idea clicked; the kind of moment every educator strives for.

I always was convinced education should be vibrant. My teaching space was a zone of amusement, creativity, and motion. We painted maps, acted out historical events, and turned lessons into stories.

Merriment always permeated the space as inquisitiveness replaced fear. Certainly, even prior to conflict, local youth were always frightened. My classroom was a secure location but after the seventh, the situation transformed.

My school became a refuge for families escaping the explosives. Soon, it was targeted and completely destroyed. There are very few educational facilities left standing in this area now. For this period, all has been unusual. The hostilities has broken every aspect of our lives: safety, homes, learning places, hopes. Apprehension and mourning are ever-present realities.

A significant number of my students are now deceased – youth who spoke of aspiring to be doctors, painters, and educators. They were denied even the entitlement to survival. Those who are still here endure hunger, eviction and exhaustion – and however, they still cling to the will to learn.

Sometimes, when the connectivity allows, I get in touch with a handful of them. They write inquiring: “Are you OK, educator?” We share concise phrases, short lessons, minor flashes of contact amid the disorder. They ask if circumstances will ever go back to normal. I state to them I don’t know.

Across Gaza, educators, aid workers and charities attempt instruction in any feasible location: in temporary structures, destroyed learning spaces, or crowded shelters. Learning has become an gesture of resistance, a way to declare: “We persist.” And so long as we continue learning, we will persist.

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