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'We seek action, not sympathy'.

Juwayriya Adwan, 12, al-Mawasi

For the past two years since I entered a learning environment. Two years since I listened to the start-of-class signal at the institution I attended, sat at my desk and raised my hand during my favourite class. At times I still distinctly recollect the familiar scents and noises: writing residue, wooden scraps, joyful sounds in corridors. But my educational institution is gone; it was targeted not long after the conflict started. My books were burned, and several classmates lost.

I was in elementary level on that fateful day: the concluding day I entered the school building. That early hours, air raid sirens blared through the passageways. Some pupils sobbed, others held hands tightly. Our teacher tried to calm us, but even her tone wavered. I remember wishing for a routine day; teaching, recess, a verse presentation. Instead, that day marked the end of my old life.

Hostilities have claimed innumerable aspects. But the toughest sacrifice of all is schooling, because it represents the forfeiture of tomorrow.

Now I reside with my parents, male relatives and female sibling in a packed refuge in al-Mawasi. The tent walls move with air currents, keeping neither cold nor heat away. We queue for sustenance and drinks. Power is imaginary and personal space is absent. Aspiration appears brittle.

At evening, I gaze toward the stars through the gaps of my tent and wonder if my friends see the comparable vista. Some contact me when they manage, stating they yearn for classes and have preserved their former exercise books; like valuables from a bygone era. I feel guilty because I’ve lost all of mine.

I once envisioned becoming a teacher to help Gaza’s children study, even when existence was challenging. Now I dream of being a writer – to draft, to talk and to show the world what it represents to be a minor in Gaza. I want to narrate our accounts of fear and hunger, but also fortitude. Because even in this place, amid fatality and debris, our words continue.

When there’s some internet, I endeavor to educate myself online. Other times, I attend a tiny space where helpers instruct us math and Arabic. The lessons are short – the energy supply stops or the airstrikes begin again but in such times, I experience vitality. I recollect who I was: the student who loved numbers and poems, who thought education could transform society.

The war has taken so much; our homes, schools and kin. I lost my uncle, his partner, and their offspring. I said goodbye to my beautiful city, Rafah, which is merely debris now. But the most painful deprivation of all is schooling, because that is the loss of the future itself.

To the global audience, I state this: preserve our aspirations. Compassion isn't enough, we demand measures. Young residents are entitled to literature, learning environments and safety. Learning is not an extravagance, it is a fundamental entitlement. Gaza is not only destruction; it is minors who still dream beneath the drones at evening. It is my account and I will continue writing, even if all I have left is a broken pencil and a scrap of damaged material.

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

An educator, 40, teacher in al-Bureij camp

I have been instructing in Gaza for over ten years. Originally in Khan Younis, then in Deir al-Balah, and now in al-Bureij camp in the heart of the region. In pre-conflict times, I used to teach six classes of about dozens of learners, almost two hundred forty individuals enthusiastic about knowledge.

Educating them was my vocation and delight in life, and I still remember the sparkle in a pupil's gaze when a knowledge was acquired; the kind of moment every instructor cherishes.

I always thought learning should be full of life. My teaching space was a zone of recreation, art, and motion. We created cartographic art, dramatized bygone episodes, and transformed instruction into narratives.

Joy always permeated the space as inquisitiveness displaced apprehension. Yes, even before the war, young residents were always afraid. My teaching space was a place of safety but after 7 October, all was altered.

My educational institution became a shelter for families running from the explosives. Not long later, it was struck and totally demolished. There are very few learning institutions still erect in the region now. For 24 months, nothing has been normal. The war has destroyed every aspect of our lives: safety, residences, learning places, aspirations. Anxiety and sorrow are perpetual experiences.

Numerous of my students are now deceased – children who spoke of becoming doctors, creatives, and educators. They were deprived even the right to exist. Those who survive endure hunger, relocation and fatigue – and yet, they still maintain the thirst for knowledge.

At times, when the connectivity enables, I get in touch with a small number of them. They contact questioning: “Are you safe, instructor?” We share short messages, short lessons, small glimmers of contact amid the chaos. They ask if things will ever go back to normal. I state to them I have no answer.

Across the region, teachers, helpers and charities endeavor education in all available spaces: in temporary structures, destroyed learning spaces, or congested safe zones. Schooling has become an gesture of resistance, a way to say: “We are still here.” And provided that we keep acquiring knowledge, we will endure.

Numerous of us are also caregivers. I am a mother of {three|several