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'We don’t want pity, we want action'.

A young student, 12, al-Mawasi

For the past 24 months since I stepped into a learning environment. That long since I listened to the morning bell at my former school, sat at my desk and participated actively during my preferred subject. Sometimes I still clearly recall the familiar scents and noises: chalk dust, pencil shavings, joyful sounds in corridors. But my educational institution is gone; it was bombed soon after the conflict started. My textbooks turned to ash, and several classmates lost.

I was in the fifth year on the seventh of October: the final day I went to school. That beginning of the day, alert signals screamed through the passageways. Some pupils sobbed, others held hands tightly. Our instructor sought to soothe, but even she sounded shaky. I remember wishing for a normal day; instruction, intermission, a verse presentation. Instead, that day signaled the conclusion of my former reality.

Conflict has stolen countless things. But the most painful deprivation of all is education, because that is the loss of the future itself.

Now I live with my mother and father, siblings and sister in a packed refuge in this coastal area. The shelter coverings sway with breezes, providing no climate control. We queue for water and food. Electricity is a dream and seclusion is unavailable. Aspiration appears brittle.

At evening, I gaze toward the celestial bodies through the holes of my temporary home and ponder if my peers see the same sky. Some reach out when they are able, expressing they long for education and have retained their old notebooks; like treasures from a lost world. I feel remorseful because I’ve lost all of mine.

I once envisioned entering the education field to support local youth learn, even when life was hard. Now I hope for being a reporter – to draft, to talk and to show the world what it means to be a minor in Gaza. I want to share our experiences of anxiety and deprivation, but also fortitude. Because even here, amid loss and destruction, our words continue.

When connectivity is available, I try to study online. Sometimes, I visit a modest shelter where volunteers teach us arithmetic and Arabic. The sessions are brief – the power fails or the airstrikes begin again but in such times, I experience vitality. I recall who I was: the girl who adored mathematics and poetry, who was convinced knowledge could alter reality.

Conflict has claimed innumerable things; our dwellings, learning centers and families. I mourned my paternal relative, his spouse, and their offspring. I forfeited my beloved urban area, Rafah, which is only ruins now. But the hardest loss of all is education, because it represents the forfeiture of tomorrow.

To the international community, I express this: preserve our aspirations. We don’t want pity, we demand measures. Gaza’s children merit books, learning environments and protection. Schooling is not optional, it is a essential privilege. The territory is not merely devastation; it is youth who still dream under aerial surveillance at evening. It is my narrative and I will keep drafting, even if the sole items remaining is a fractured utensil and a piece of torn paper.

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

Naglaa Weshah, forty, instructor in central Gaza

I have been instructing in the region for over ten years. Initially in that urban area, then in Deir al-Balah, and currently in al-Bureij camp in the middle of the territory. Before the war started, I typically educated six classes of about fourty pupils per class, almost two hundred forty individuals eager to learn.

Instructing them was my mission and happiness in reality, and I still recollect the gleam in a student’s eyes when a knowledge was acquired; the type of instance every educator cherishes.

I always thought instruction should be vibrant. My learning environment was a space of amusement, art, and activity. We designed geographical illustrations, acted out historical events, and transformed instruction into narratives.

Merriment always occupied the area as inquisitiveness displaced fear. Yes, even in earlier times, local youth were always frightened. My learning environment was a protected zone but after that day, the situation transformed.

My learning center became a shelter for families fleeing the bombs. Shortly after, it was targeted and totally demolished. There are very few educational facilities still erect in this area now. For two years, everything has been abnormal. The war has shattered every aspect of our existence: safety, homes, educational centers, hopes. Apprehension and mourning are constant companions.

Many of my students are now lost – children who spoke of dreaming of doctors, painters, and teachers. They were deprived even the entitlement to survival. Those who are still here live with starvation, eviction and exhaustion – and however, they still cling to the desire for education.

Occasionally, when the internet permits, I get in touch with a handful of them. They message asking: “How are you, instructor?” We share short messages, abbreviated teaching, tiny sparks of contact amid the chaos. They ask if things will ever go back to normal. I tell them I have no answer.

Throughout this territory, instructors, volunteers and charities try to teach wherever possible: in tents, destroyed learning spaces, or congested safe zones. Learning has become an demonstration of perseverance, a way to declare: “Our presence continues.” And so long as we continue learning, we will endure.

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