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'We seek action, not sympathy'.

A young student, 12, al-Mawasi

For the past 24 months since I was last inside a real classroom. Two years since I heard the morning bell at the institution I attended, occupied my place and answered questions during my beloved lesson. Occasionally I still clearly recall the auditory and olfactory sensations: chalk dust, sharpener leftovers, laughter echoing down the halls. But my educational institution is gone; it was targeted not long after the conflict started. My books were burned, and some of my friends killed.

I was in elementary level on that fateful day: the last day I entered the school building. That morning, warning alarms sounded through the halls. Some children cried, others held hands tightly. Our teacher tried to calm us, but even her tone wavered. I remember wishing for a normal day; teaching, intermission, a poem recital. Instead, that day marked the end of my previous existence.

The war has taken so much. But the hardest loss of all is schooling, because without it, our prospects disappear.

Now I live with my guardians, siblings and sister in a packed refuge in this coastal area. The temporary partitions sway with breezes, failing to insulate. We queue for water and food. Energy access is fantasy and privacy doesn’t exist. Hope feels fragile.

At darkness, I look up at the night lights through the holes of my tent and wonder if my companions see the comparable vista. Some message me when they are able, stating they yearn for classes and have preserved their former exercise books; like relics of a vanished time. I feel ashamed because I’ve forfeited all of mine.

I once aspired to becoming a teacher to support Gaza’s children study, even when life was hard. Now I hope for being a journalist – to draft, to speak and to reveal the world what it means to be a child in this region. I want to tell our stories of anxiety and deprivation, but also bravery. Because even amid these conditions, amid loss and destruction, our words continue.

When there’s some internet, I try to study online. On other occasions, I go to a small tent where volunteers educate us arithmetic and Arabic. The lessons are short – the energy supply stops or the attacks recommence but in such times, I feel alive. I recollect who I was: the girl who cherished arithmetic and verse, who thought learning could change the world.

Hostilities have stolen countless aspects; our dwellings, learning centers and families. I lost my uncle, his spouse, and their young ones. I said goodbye to my beloved urban area, that southern city, which is only ruins now. But the hardest loss of all is education, because without it, our prospects disappear.

To the world, I express this: keep our hopes alive. Compassion isn't enough, we require steps. The youth merit texts, educational facilities and safety. Learning is not optional, it is a essential privilege. The territory is not just ruins; it is youth who still dream beneath the drones at evening. It is my account and I will continue writing, even if the sole items remaining is a fractured utensil and a scrap of damaged material.

'Students ask: "Teacher, are you safe?"'.

An educator, forty, instructor in a refugee camp

I have been educating in this area for more than a decade. First in that urban area, then in Deir al-Balah, and now in the central camp in the heart of the region. In pre-conflict times, I used to teach multiple groups of about 40 students each, hundreds of eager students enthusiastic about knowledge.

Instructing them was my mission and happiness in reality, and I still remember the twinkle in a learner's look when a knowledge was acquired; the sort of occasion every educator cherishes.

I always believed instruction should be full of life. My learning environment was a space of recreation, aesthetics, and activity. We created cartographic art, acted out historical events, and transformed instruction into narratives.

Joy always occupied the area as inquisitiveness displaced apprehension. Indeed, even before the war, local youth were always afraid. My teaching space was a secure location but after 7 October, the situation transformed.

My educational institution became a safe haven for families fleeing the bombs. Soon, it was targeted and entirely ruined. There are very few schools remaining intact in the region now. For this period, everything has been abnormal. The war has shattered every part of our lives: safety, homes, learning places, aspirations. Anxiety and sorrow are constant companions.

Many of my learners are now lost – minors who talked about aspiring to be physicians, painters, and instructors. They were deprived even the privilege of living. Those who survive live with malnutrition, relocation and weariness – and however, they still hold onto the thirst for knowledge.

At times, when the internet allows, I hear from a small number of them. They write inquiring: “Are you safe, teacher?” We share short messages, miniature instruction, small glimmers of interaction amid the disorder. They question if situations will ever return to usual. I inform them I don’t know.

Across Gaza, teachers, volunteers and charities try to teach in all available spaces: in shelters, damaged classrooms, or congested safe zones. Schooling has become an demonstration of perseverance, a way to declare: “We are still here.” And provided that we persist in education, we will remain.

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