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'We don’t want pity, we want action'.

Juwayriya Adwan, twelve, Khan Younis

It has been 24 months since I entered a real classroom. That long since I listened to the morning bell at the institution I attended, sat at my desk and answered questions during my preferred subject. Occasionally I still distinctly recollect the auditory and olfactory sensations: chalk dust, pencil shavings, cheerful echoes. But my learning place was destroyed; it was targeted not long after the hostilities erupted. My books were burned, and some of my friends killed.

I was in the fifth year on the seventh of October: the concluding day I entered the school building. That beginning of the day, alert signals sounded through the passageways. Some children cried, others clasped palms firmly. Our educator attempted reassurance, but even she sounded shaky. I remember hoping for a routine day; lessons, break time, a literary performance. Instead, that day marked the end of my old life.

The war has taken so much. But the hardest loss of all is learning, because that is the loss of the future itself.

Now I live with my parents, siblings and sister in a packed refuge in this coastal area. The temporary partitions sway with breezes, failing to insulate. We wait in line for water and food. Energy access is fantasy and privacy doesn’t exist. Optimism seems delicate.

At night, I look up at the night lights through the holes of my shelter and ponder if my peers see the comparable vista. Some contact me when they are able, saying they miss school and have kept their former exercise books; like treasures from a lost world. I feel ashamed because I’ve misplaced all of mine.

I once envisioned entering the education field to help young residents acquire knowledge, even when circumstances were difficult. Now I hope for being a writer – to write, to communicate and to demonstrate the world what it represents to be a child in Gaza. I want to tell our stories of apprehension and need, but also bravery. Because even in this place, amid loss and destruction, our voices refuse to be silent.

When there’s some internet, I try to study digitally. On other occasions, I go to a small tent where helpers instruct us mathematics and language. The lessons are short – the energy supply stops or the airstrikes begin again but in those moments, I sense being. I remember who I was: the student who loved numbers and poems, who was convinced learning could change the world.

The war has taken so much; our residences, educational institutions and kin. I grieved for my family member, his spouse, and their offspring. I forfeited my cherished hometown, that southern city, which is nothing but rubble now. But the most painful deprivation of all is schooling, because without it, our prospects disappear.

To the international community, I express this: preserve our aspirations. We seek no sympathy, we demand measures. Young residents merit texts, educational facilities and safety. Education is not a luxury, it is a essential privilege. Gaza is not just ruins; it is youth who persist in hoping amid unmanned aircraft at night. It is my story and I will keep drafting, even if the sole items remaining is a fractured utensil and a piece of torn paper.

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

Naglaa Weshah, forty, instructor in central Gaza

I have been educating in this area for more than a decade. Initially in Khan Younis, then in Deir al-Balah, and currently in al-Bureij camp in the heart of the region. Before the war started, I typically educated six classes of about dozens of learners, almost two hundred forty individuals eager to learn.

Educating them was my mission and happiness in reality, and I still recollect the sparkle in a learner's look when a knowledge was acquired; the kind of moment every instructor cherishes.

I always was convinced education should be dynamic. My teaching space was a space of amusement, creativity, and motion. We painted maps, dramatized bygone episodes, and transformed instruction into narratives.

Joy always filled the room as curiosity replaced anxiety. Yes, even before the war, local youth were always frightened. My classroom was a secure location but after the seventh, everything changed.

My school became a safe haven for households fleeing the explosives. Shortly after, it was struck and completely destroyed. There are very few educational facilities left standing in the region now. For this period, everything has been abnormal. The war has destroyed every part of our existence: protection, residences, schools, aspirations. Apprehension and mourning are ever-present realities.

Many of my pupils are now lost – youth who spoke of aspiring to be doctors, creatives, and educators. They were denied even the right to exist. Those who remain live with starvation, eviction and fatigue – and nevertheless, they still maintain the desire for education.

Occasionally, when the connectivity permits, I hear from a few of them. They write questioning: “Are you safe, teacher?” We share brief words, abbreviated teaching, minor flashes of interaction amid the turmoil. They question if things will ever revert to standard. I inform them I am uncertain.

Across this territory, teachers, volunteers and organizations try to teach wherever possible: in tents, destroyed learning spaces, or crowded shelters. Schooling has become an act of defiance, a way to say: “We are still here.” And as long as we continue learning, we will endure.

Numerous of us are also parents. I am a guardian of {three|several