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'We don’t want pity, we want action'.

Juwayriya Adwan, 12, al-Mawasi

It has been two years since I entered a real classroom. Two years since I listened to the school chime at the institution I attended, occupied my place and participated actively during my favourite class. Sometimes I still vividly remember the familiar scents and noises: writing residue, wooden scraps, joyful sounds in corridors. But my school no longer exists; it was targeted not long after the conflict started. My textbooks turned to ash, and some of my friends killed.

I was in fifth grade on the seventh of October: the final day I went to school. That morning, warning alarms sounded through the passageways. Some children cried, others gripped each other. Our instructor sought to soothe, but even her tone wavered. I remember wishing for a ordinary day; teaching, break time, a literary performance. Instead, that day became the last page of my old life.

Hostilities have claimed innumerable aspects. But the most painful deprivation of all is learning, because it represents the forfeiture of tomorrow.

Now I reside with my mother and father, male relatives and sister in a crowded shelter in al-Mawasi. The tent walls flap in the wind, failing to insulate. We wait in line for nourishment and hydration. Electricity is a dream and privacy doesn’t exist. Hope feels fragile.

At night, I look up at the night lights through the holes of my tent and question if my companions see the comparable vista. Some reach out when they manage, expressing they long for education and have preserved their previous journals; like relics of a vanished time. I feel guilty because I’ve misplaced all of mine.

I once aspired to entering the education field to support local youth learn, even when existence was challenging. Now I dream of being a reporter – to compose, to talk and to demonstrate the world what it means to be a child in the Strip. I want to share our experiences of anxiety and deprivation, but also fortitude. Because even in this place, amid loss and destruction, our expressions persist.

When online access exists, I try to study via the web. On other occasions, I visit a modest shelter where helpers instruct us math and Arabic. The instruction is limited – the electricity cuts out or the airstrikes begin again but in those moments, I sense being. I recall who I was: the girl who cherished arithmetic and verse, who was convinced education could transform society.

The war has taken so much; our residences, educational institutions and kin. I grieved for my paternal relative, his wife, and their children. I lost my beautiful city, Rafah, which is merely debris now. But the hardest loss of all is education, because it represents the forfeiture of tomorrow.

To the global audience, I express this: preserve our aspirations. We don’t want pity, we require steps. Young residents deserve literature, educational facilities and security. Learning is not a luxury, it is a basic right. Gaza is not only destruction; it is children who still dream beneath the drones at night. It is my account and I will keep drafting, even if the sole items remaining is a fractured utensil and a piece of torn paper.

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

An educator, forty, instructor in central Gaza

I have been instructing in this area for over ten years. Initially in that urban area, then in a different town, and currently in this refugee settlement in the central Gaza Strip. Prior to hostilities, I typically educated multiple groups of about 40 students each, nearly 240 young minds enthusiastic about knowledge.

Educating them was my purpose and joy in reality, and I still remember the sparkle in a pupil's gaze when a knowledge was acquired; the kind of moment every educator lives for.

I always believed instruction should be full of life. My learning environment was a area of play, art, and activity. We designed geographical illustrations, performed past occurrences, and transformed instruction into narratives.

Merriment always filled the room as curiosity substituted anxiety. Indeed, even in earlier times, children in Gaza were always frightened. My teaching space was a protected zone but after the seventh, everything changed.

My educational institution became a refuge for households escaping the aerial attacks. Shortly after, it was attacked and totally demolished. There are very few educational facilities remaining intact in this area now. For 24 months, all has been unusual. The conflict has destroyed every facet of our existence: protection, dwellings, educational centers, hopes. Apprehension and mourning are constant companions.

A significant number of my students are now dead – youth who talked about becoming medical professionals, creatives, and teachers. They were deprived even the privilege of living. Those who are still here endure malnutrition, relocation and exhaustion – and however, they still maintain the will to learn.

Occasionally, when the connectivity allows, I get in touch with a handful of them. They write inquiring: “Are you safe, instructor?” We communicate concise phrases, abbreviated teaching, minor flashes of interaction amid the chaos. They ask if situations will ever return to usual. I inform them I am uncertain.

Throughout Gaza, educators, volunteers and non-profits endeavor education in all available spaces: in tents, damaged classrooms, or packed refuges. Schooling has become an demonstration of perseverance, a way to say: “Our presence continues.” And provided that we continue learning, we will endure.

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