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'We don’t want pity, we want action'.

A young student, 12, a temporary shelter

For the past 24 months since I stepped into a proper school. That long since I heard the school chime at the institution I attended, sat at my desk and participated actively during my preferred subject. Sometimes I still distinctly recollect the sounds and smells: writing residue, sharpener leftovers, laughter echoing down the halls. But my educational institution is gone; it was targeted not long after the hostilities erupted. My textbooks turned to ash, and some of my friends killed.

I was in elementary level on the seventh of October: the concluding day I entered the school building. That morning, warning alarms screamed through the passageways. Some children cried, others clasped palms firmly. Our educator attempted reassurance, but even her voice trembled. I remember wishing for a routine day; teaching, break time, a verse presentation. Instead, that day signaled the conclusion of my former reality.

Conflict has stolen countless things. But the toughest sacrifice of all is schooling, because it represents the forfeiture of tomorrow.

Now I reside with my guardians, two brothers and sister in a congested safe space in this coastal area. The tent walls sway with breezes, providing no climate control. We wait in line for water and food. Power is imaginary and personal space is absent. Aspiration appears brittle.

At evening, I look up at the stars through the gaps of my temporary home and wonder if my friends see the comparable vista. Some reach out when they manage, stating they yearn for classes and have kept their previous journals; like treasures from a lost world. I feel guilty because I’ve misplaced all of mine.

I once envisioned entering the education field to assist local youth acquire knowledge, even when existence was challenging. Now I aim for being a writer – to write, to talk and to show the world what it represents to be a minor in this region. I want to narrate our accounts of anxiety and deprivation, but also bravery. Because even in this place, amid fatality and debris, our words continue.

When there’s some internet, I endeavor to educate myself digitally. Sometimes, I visit a modest shelter where volunteers teach us mathematics and language. The instruction is limited – the energy supply stops or the bombing resumes but in these instances, I experience vitality. 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 residences, learning centers and relatives. I mourned my paternal relative, his wife, and their children. I lost my cherished hometown, my previous home, which is nothing but rubble now. But the hardest loss of all is schooling, because that is the loss of the future itself.

To the international community, I express this: don’t let our dreams die. Compassion isn't enough, we want action. Gaza’s children deserve books, educational facilities and protection. Learning is not optional, it is a basic right. Gaza is not just ruins; it is children who persist in hoping under aerial surveillance at darkness. It is my account and I will persist in composing, even if my only possessions is a fractured utensil and a fragment of ripped sheet.

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

An educator, forty, instructor in al-Bureij camp

I have been educating in Gaza for over ten years. Originally in that urban area, then in another location, and now in this refugee settlement in the middle of the territory. Prior to hostilities, I typically educated several sets of about 40 students each, almost two hundred forty individuals keen on education.

Educating them was my purpose and joy in life, and I still recall the gleam in a pupil's gaze when a knowledge was acquired; the kind of moment every teacher cherishes.

I always was convinced education should be vibrant. My classroom was a zone of recreation, art, and motion. We painted maps, acted out historical events, and transformed instruction into narratives.

Joy always filled the room as inquisitiveness displaced fear. Certainly, even before the war, children in Gaza were always frightened. My classroom was a protected zone but after 7 October, all was altered.

My educational institution became a safe haven for families running from the bombs. Shortly after, it was struck and totally demolished. There are hardly any learning institutions left standing in this area now. For 24 months, all has been unusual. The hostilities has destroyed every facet of our reality: protection, residences, schools, dreams. Anxiety and sorrow are perpetual experiences.

Numerous of my students are now lost – youth who talked about becoming medical professionals, painters, and instructors. They were denied even the privilege of living. Those who are still here experience malnutrition, eviction and weariness – and however, they still maintain the thirst for knowledge.

At times, when the connectivity enables, I get in touch with a handful of them. They write questioning: “Are you safe, instructor?” We share concise phrases, miniature instruction, tiny sparks of connection amid the chaos. They inquire if things will ever go back to normal. I state to them I have no answer.

All over this territory, teachers, aid workers and non-profits try to teach in all available spaces: in tents, damaged classrooms, or crowded shelters. Learning has become an gesture of resistance, a way to express: “We persist.” And provided that we persist in education, we will persist.

A significant number of us are also caregivers. I am a guardian of {three|several