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'We seek action, not sympathy'.

Juwayriya Adwan, twelve, a temporary shelter

It has been 24 months since I entered a proper school. That long since I listened to the morning bell at Khawla Bint al-Azwar school, sat at my desk and raised my hand during my beloved lesson. Sometimes I still vividly remember the sounds and smells: chalk dust, sharpener leftovers, joyful sounds in corridors. But my learning place was destroyed; it was bombed not long after the war began. My learning materials incinerated, and some of my friends killed.

I was in the fifth year on 7 October: the concluding day I entered the school building. That beginning of the day, warning alarms sounded through the halls. Some pupils sobbed, others gripped each other. Our educator attempted reassurance, but even she sounded shaky. I remember wishing for a normal day; teaching, break time, a verse presentation. Instead, that day signaled the conclusion of my old life.

The war has taken so much. But the most painful deprivation of all is learning, because it represents the forfeiture of tomorrow.

Now I dwell alongside my parents, siblings and sister in a crowded shelter in Khan Younis. The tent walls flap in the wind, failing to insulate. We line up for water and food. Electricity is a dream and seclusion is unavailable. Aspiration appears brittle.

At darkness, I gaze toward the stars through the holes of my tent and ponder if my peers see the comparable vista. Some reach out when they manage, saying they yearn for classes and have kept their previous journals; like valuables from a bygone era. I feel remorseful because I’ve misplaced all of mine.

I once aspired to becoming a teacher to assist local youth acquire knowledge, even when circumstances were difficult. Now I dream of being a journalist – to draft, to communicate and to reveal the world what it represents to be a child in Gaza. I want to narrate our accounts of anxiety and deprivation, but also fortitude. Because even here, amid fatality and debris, our words continue.

When there’s some internet, I endeavor to educate myself online. On other occasions, I attend a tiny space where helpers teach us mathematics and language. The lessons are short – the electricity cuts out or the airstrikes begin again but in those moments, I sense being. I recollect who I was: the girl who loved numbers and poems, who was convinced education could transform society.

The war has taken so much; our dwellings, learning centers and families. I mourned my uncle, his wife, and their children. I forfeited my beloved urban area, that southern city, which is merely debris now. But the most painful deprivation of all is schooling, because that is the loss of the future itself.

To the global audience, I state this: don’t let our dreams die. We seek no sympathy, we want action. Young residents merit literature, schools and protection. Education is not an extravagance, it is a basic right. This region is not merely devastation; it is minors who persist in hoping under aerial surveillance at evening. It is my account and I will persist in composing, even if my only possessions is a broken pencil and a fragment of ripped sheet.

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

An educator, 40, instructor in a refugee camp

I have been teaching in Gaza for over ten years. Initially in that urban area, then in Deir al-Balah, and currently in this refugee settlement in the middle of the territory. Before the war started, I used to teach multiple groups of about fourty pupils per class, hundreds of eager students keen on education.

Instructing them was my mission and happiness in life, and I still recollect the sparkle in a pupil's gaze when a concept was understood; the kind of moment every teacher strives for.

I always was convinced instruction should be full of life. My learning environment was a space of play, aesthetics, and motion. We created cartographic art, performed past occurrences, and turned lessons into stories.

Laughter always occupied the area as interest displaced apprehension. Indeed, even before the war, local youth were always frightened. My classroom was a protected zone but after that day, everything changed.

My educational institution became a safe haven for households fleeing the aerial attacks. Not long later, it was targeted and totally demolished. There are almost no schools remaining intact in the region now. For 24 months, nothing has been normal. The war has destroyed every part of our existence: security, dwellings, schools, dreams. Apprehension and mourning are ever-present realities.

A significant number of my learners are now lost – minors who talked about becoming doctors, creatives, and educators. They were deprived even the entitlement to survival. Those who are still here live with hunger, relocation and weariness – and nevertheless, they still maintain the desire for education.

At times, when the internet allows, I get in touch with a handful of them. They write inquiring: “How are you, educator?” We exchange brief words, miniature instruction, small glimmers of contact amid the chaos. They question if situations will ever return to usual. I tell them I am uncertain.

All over this territory, instructors, helpers and organizations endeavor education in all available spaces: in shelters, ruined educational areas, or congested safe zones. Learning has become an demonstration of perseverance, a way to declare: “We persist.” And as long as we keep acquiring knowledge, we will endure.

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