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'We don’t want pity, we want action'.

Juwayriya Adwan, 12, Khan Younis

It has been two years since I was last inside a proper school. Two years since I heard the school chime at my former school, took my seat and answered questions during my favourite class. Occasionally I still vividly remember the sounds and smells: chalk dust, wooden scraps, cheerful echoes. But my school no longer exists; it was targeted soon after the hostilities erupted. My textbooks turned to ash, and several classmates lost.

I was in elementary level on 7 October: the final day I entered the school building. That morning, warning alarms sounded through the halls. Some pupils sobbed, others held hands tightly. Our instructor sought to soothe, but even her tone wavered. I remember longing for a routine day; lessons, intermission, a literary performance. Instead, that day marked the end of my old life.

The war has taken so much. But the toughest sacrifice of all is learning, because it represents the forfeiture of tomorrow.

Now I reside with my mother and father, siblings and sister in a crowded shelter in al-Mawasi. The shelter coverings move with air currents, providing no climate control. We line up for nourishment and hydration. Energy access is fantasy and privacy doesn’t exist. Hope feels fragile.

At evening, I observe the night lights through the holes of my tent and question if my companions see the identical heavens. Some reach out when they can, saying they long for education and have retained their old notebooks; like treasures from a lost world. I feel ashamed because I’ve forfeited all of mine.

I once aspired to entering the education field to support Gaza’s children learn, even when circumstances were difficult. Now I dream of being a journalist – to draft, to speak and to reveal the world what it represents to be a child in this region. I want to tell our stories of anxiety and deprivation, but also bravery. Because even in this place, amid loss and destruction, our voices refuse to be silent.

When there’s some internet, I endeavor to educate myself digitally. Other times, I attend a modest shelter where volunteers instruct us arithmetic and Arabic. The instruction is limited – the energy supply stops or the airstrikes begin again but in these instances, I experience vitality. I recall who I was: the girl who loved numbers and poems, who was convinced knowledge could alter reality.

Hostilities have stolen countless aspects; our residences, educational institutions and families. I lost my family member, his wife, and their offspring. I lost my beloved urban area, my previous home, which is nothing but rubble now. But the toughest sacrifice of all is learning, 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 merit books, educational facilities and safety. Learning is not an extravagance, it is a fundamental entitlement. This region is not merely devastation; it is children 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 damaged writing tool and a fragment of ripped sheet.

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

Naglaa Weshah, forty, instructor in central Gaza

I have been teaching in this area for more than a decade. Originally in that urban area, then in Deir al-Balah, and currently in al-Bureij camp in the middle of the territory. Before the war started, I used to teach several sets of about 40 students each, almost two hundred forty individuals eager to learn.

Teaching them was my purpose and joy in life, and I still recall the twinkle in a learner's look when a concept was understood; the type of instance every instructor lives for.

I always was convinced learning should be full of life. My teaching space was a area of play, creativity, and motion. We designed geographical illustrations, dramatized bygone episodes, and turned lessons into stories.

Joy always filled the room as inquisitiveness substituted anxiety. Indeed, even in earlier times, children in Gaza were always afraid. My learning environment was a protected zone but after that day, the situation transformed.

My learning center became a safe haven for relatives running from the explosives. Soon, it was attacked and totally demolished. There are very few educational facilities left standing in the region now. For 24 months, all has been unusual. The hostilities has broken every aspect of our lives: security, dwellings, schools, aspirations. Anxiety and sorrow are ever-present realities.

Numerous of my learners are now lost – children who spoke of dreaming of doctors, painters, and educators. They were refused even the right to exist. Those who survive live with starvation, displacement and weariness – and however, they still maintain the will to learn.

Sometimes, when the online access allows, I hear from a few of them. They message inquiring: “How are you, instructor?” We share concise phrases, short lessons, small glimmers of connection amid the turmoil. They ask if circumstances will ever revert to standard. I state to them I am uncertain.

Across this territory, instructors, aid workers and charities try to teach in all available spaces: in shelters, damaged classrooms, or packed refuges. Learning has become an act of defiance, a way to declare: “We are still here.” And provided that we continue learning, we will remain.

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