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'We don’t want pity, we want action'.

A young student, 12, a temporary shelter

For the past two years since I was last inside a learning environment. That long since I heard the school chime at Khawla Bint al-Azwar school, occupied my place and raised my hand during my preferred subject. At times I still vividly remember the auditory and olfactory sensations: powder from the board, sharpener leftovers, cheerful echoes. But my educational institution is gone; it was struck shortly after the conflict started. My books were burned, and several classmates lost.

I was in elementary level on that fateful day: the final day I attended classes. That beginning of the day, air raid sirens sounded through the passageways. Some pupils sobbed, others gripped each other. Our educator attempted reassurance, but even her voice trembled. I remember longing for a routine day; instruction, intermission, a verse presentation. Instead, that day became the last page of my former reality.

The war has taken so much. But the most painful deprivation of all is learning, because without it, our prospects disappear.

Now I reside with my guardians, male relatives and sister in a congested safe space in this coastal area. The temporary partitions move with air currents, failing to insulate. We line up for sustenance and drinks. Power is imaginary and privacy doesn’t exist. Aspiration appears brittle.

At evening, I observe the stars through the holes of my shelter and wonder if my peers see the comparable vista. Some reach out when they manage, expressing they miss school and have kept their previous journals; like valuables from a bygone era. I feel guilty because I’ve lost all of mine.

I once dreamed of pursuing pedagogy to help young residents acquire knowledge, even when existence was challenging. Now I hope for being a journalist – to draft, to speak and to demonstrate the world what it means to be a child in Gaza. I want to tell our stories of apprehension and need, but also bravery. Because even here, amid loss and destruction, our expressions persist.

When connectivity is available, I try to study online. On other occasions, I visit a modest shelter where helpers educate us math and Arabic. The instruction is limited – the electricity cuts out or the airstrikes begin again but in such times, I sense being. I recollect who I was: the young woman who loved numbers and poems, who was convinced knowledge could alter reality.

Hostilities have stolen countless aspects; our homes, educational institutions and kin. I mourned my uncle, his spouse, and their young ones. I forfeited my beloved urban area, that southern city, which is nothing but rubble now. But the toughest sacrifice of all is education, because without it, our prospects disappear.

To the international community, I say this: don’t let our dreams die. Compassion isn't enough, we demand measures. Gaza’s children merit texts, educational facilities and security. Learning is not optional, it is a basic right. The territory is not only destruction; it is youth who still dream under aerial surveillance at evening. It is my story and I will keep drafting, even if my only possessions is a broken pencil and a fragment of ripped sheet.

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

An educator, forty, teacher in a refugee camp

I have been teaching in Gaza for a substantial period. Initially in Khan Younis, then in Deir al-Balah, and now in al-Bureij camp in the central Gaza Strip. In pre-conflict times, I regularly instructed six classes of about dozens of learners, hundreds of eager students eager to learn.

Instructing them was my purpose and joy in existence, and I still recall the gleam in a student’s eyes when a concept was understood; the kind of moment every instructor lives for.

I always was convinced instruction should be dynamic. My teaching space was a area of play, art, and motion. We painted maps, acted out historical events, and turned lessons into stories.

Laughter always occupied the area as curiosity replaced fear. Indeed, even in earlier times, young residents were always frightened. My teaching space was a place of safety but after 7 October, all was altered.

My school became a safe haven for families fleeing the bombs. Soon, it was attacked and totally demolished. There are hardly any learning institutions left standing in the region now. For this period, all has been unusual. The conflict has destroyed every part of our existence: security, dwellings, schools, aspirations. Fear and grief are ever-present realities.

Many of my pupils are now dead – minors who spoke of aspiring to be physicians, artists, and instructors. They were refused even the entitlement to survival. Those who survive live with malnutrition, relocation and fatigue – and yet, they still hold onto the desire for education.

Occasionally, when the connectivity enables, I hear from a few of them. They message questioning: “Are you OK, educator?” We communicate brief words, abbreviated teaching, tiny sparks of interaction amid the chaos. They inquire if things will ever go back to normal. I inform them I don’t know.

All over this territory, educators, helpers and non-profits try to teach wherever possible: in tents, ruined educational areas, or crowded shelters. Learning has become an gesture of resistance, a way to say: “We are still here.” And as long as we keep acquiring knowledge, we will remain.

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