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'Our plea is for action, not compassion'.

A young student, 12, al-Mawasi

It has been 24 months since I stepped into a real classroom. Two years since I heard the school chime at my former school, took my seat and raised my hand during my favourite class. Sometimes I still vividly remember the auditory and olfactory sensations: writing residue, pencil shavings, laughter echoing down the halls. But my educational institution is gone; it was bombed shortly after the war began. My textbooks turned to ash, and several classmates lost.

I was in elementary level on that fateful day: the concluding day I attended classes. That morning, warning alarms sounded through the passageways. Some children cried, others held hands tightly. Our educator attempted reassurance, but even her voice trembled. I remember wishing for a routine day; instruction, recess, a poem recital. Instead, that day became the last page of my previous existence.

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

Now I live with my guardians, siblings and sister in a congested safe space in Khan Younis. The tent walls flap in the wind, keeping neither cold nor heat away. We line up for water and food. Power is imaginary and seclusion is unavailable. Hope feels fragile.

At night, I look up at the stars through the gaps of my tent and ponder if my friends see the same sky. Some reach out when they manage, expressing they long for education and have retained their former exercise books; like treasures from a lost world. I feel ashamed because I’ve misplaced all of mine.

I once dreamed of entering the education field to assist young residents study, even when existence was challenging. Now I hope for being a reporter – to compose, to communicate and to reveal the world what it means to be a child in the Strip. I want to tell our stories of apprehension and need, but also bravery. Because even amid these conditions, amid loss and destruction, our voices refuse to be silent.

When there’s some internet, I try to study online. Other times, I visit a small tent where volunteers educate us math and Arabic. The lessons are short – the energy supply stops or the airstrikes begin again but in such times, I sense being. I remember who I was: the young woman who loved numbers and poems, who believed education could transform society.

The war has taken so much; our residences, learning centers and families. I grieved for my family member, his wife, and their offspring. I forfeited my beloved urban area, that southern city, which is merely debris now. But the most painful deprivation of all is learning, because without it, our prospects disappear.

To the global audience, I state this: keep our hopes alive. We don’t want pity, we demand measures. Gaza’s children are entitled to texts, schools and safety. Learning is not an extravagance, it is a basic right. This region is not just ruins; it is children who continue to aspire beneath the drones at evening. It is my narrative and I will keep drafting, even if all I have left is a fractured utensil and a scrap of damaged material.

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

An educator, forty, instructor in al-Bureij camp

I have been instructing in this area for more than a decade. First in a southern city, then in Deir al-Balah, and presently in al-Bureij camp in the middle of the territory. In pre-conflict times, I regularly instructed several sets of about 40 students each, hundreds of eager students keen on education.

Educating them was my vocation and delight in reality, and I still remember the gleam in a student’s eyes when a knowledge was acquired; the sort of occasion every teacher lives for.

I always was convinced learning should be full of life. My learning environment was a space of recreation, art, and motion. We painted maps, performed past occurrences, and transformed instruction into narratives.

Joy always filled the room as interest replaced apprehension. Certainly, even prior to conflict, children in Gaza were always frightened. My teaching space was a place of safety but after that day, the situation transformed.

My educational institution became a safe haven for families escaping the aerial attacks. Shortly after, it was struck and entirely ruined. There are almost no educational facilities remaining intact in Gaza now. For this period, all has been unusual. The war has destroyed every facet of our existence: safety, homes, learning places, dreams. Apprehension and mourning are perpetual experiences.

Many of my pupils are now deceased – youth who talked about dreaming of doctors, painters, and educators. They were deprived even the entitlement to survival. Those who remain experience hunger, eviction and weariness – and nevertheless, they still maintain the will to learn.

At times, when the internet enables, I get in touch with a few of them. They contact questioning: “Are you safe, instructor?” We communicate brief words, abbreviated teaching, minor flashes of interaction amid the disorder. They ask if circumstances will ever go back to normal. I state to them I have no answer.

Throughout this territory, teachers, aid workers and charities attempt instruction in all available spaces: in tents, ruined educational areas, or congested safe zones. Learning has become an act of defiance, a way to declare: “Our presence continues.” And as long as we persist in education, we will remain.

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