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'We seek action, not sympathy'.

A young student, twelve, al-Mawasi

For the past two years since I was last inside a real classroom. Two years since I heard the start-of-class signal at the institution I attended, sat at my desk and participated actively during my favourite class. Occasionally I still vividly remember the sounds and smells: chalk dust, sharpener leftovers, laughter echoing down the halls. But my educational institution is gone; it was bombed not long after the conflict started. My books were burned, and companions perished.

I was in the fifth year on the seventh of October: the last day I entered the school building. That morning, alert signals blared through the halls. Some children cried, others clasped palms firmly. Our teacher tried to calm us, but even she sounded shaky. I remember longing for a routine day; lessons, recess, a literary performance. Instead, that day became the last page of my old life.

Conflict has stolen countless things. But the most painful deprivation of all is education, because it represents the forfeiture of tomorrow.

Now I dwell alongside my guardians, siblings and sister in a congested safe space in al-Mawasi. The temporary partitions flap in the wind, keeping neither cold nor heat away. We queue for nourishment and hydration. Electricity is a dream and seclusion is unavailable. Optimism seems delicate.

At darkness, I look up at the celestial bodies through the openings of my shelter and ponder if my companions see the comparable vista. Some reach out when they manage, expressing they miss school and have preserved their previous journals; like valuables from a bygone era. I feel guilty because I’ve lost all of mine.

I once envisioned entering the education field to assist local youth acquire knowledge, even when circumstances were difficult. Now I aim for being a reporter – to write, to speak and to reveal the world what it represents to be a young person in Gaza. I want to narrate our accounts of anxiety and deprivation, but also bravery. Because even in this place, amid fatality and debris, our words continue.

When there’s some internet, I try to study online. Other times, I go to a small tent where volunteers teach us mathematics and language. The instruction is limited – the energy supply stops or the attacks recommence but in such times, I sense being. I recall who I was: the student who loved numbers and poems, who thought education could transform society.

Hostilities have stolen countless aspects; our residences, learning centers and relatives. I grieved for my uncle, his wife, and their young ones. I said goodbye to my beloved urban area, my previous home, which is only ruins now. But the hardest loss of all is education, because that is the loss of the future itself.

To the international community, I say this: preserve our aspirations. We seek no sympathy, we demand measures. The youth deserve books, schools and security. Schooling is not an extravagance, it is a basic right. Gaza is not merely devastation; it is youth who still dream under aerial surveillance at darkness. It is my story and I will keep drafting, even if my only possessions is a damaged writing tool and a piece of torn paper.

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

Naglaa Weshah, 40, instructor in central Gaza

I have been instructing in Gaza for more than a decade. First in a southern city, then in another location, and currently in the central camp in the central Gaza Strip. Prior to hostilities, I used to teach six classes of about fourty pupils per class, nearly 240 young minds eager to learn.

Educating them was my vocation and delight in reality, and I still recollect the sparkle in a student’s eyes when a new idea clicked; the type of instance every instructor strives for.

I always was convinced instruction should be full of life. My learning environment was a space of recreation, aesthetics, and movement. We created cartographic art, dramatized bygone episodes, and turned lessons into stories.

Laughter always permeated the space as curiosity replaced fear. Certainly, even in earlier times, local youth were always frightened. My classroom was a place of safety but after the seventh, the situation transformed.

My school became a safe haven for relatives escaping the aerial attacks. Not long later, it was struck and totally demolished. There are almost no schools still erect in the region now. For 24 months, nothing has been normal. The hostilities has destroyed every part of our existence: security, dwellings, learning places, hopes. Apprehension and mourning are perpetual experiences.

Many of my learners are now dead – children who mentioned dreaming of medical professionals, painters, and instructors. They were deprived even the entitlement to survival. Those who are still here endure hunger, relocation and fatigue – and yet, they still hold onto the desire for education.

Sometimes, when the online access allows, I get in touch with a small number of them. They write questioning: “How are you, instructor?” We communicate concise phrases, abbreviated teaching, tiny sparks of interaction amid the turmoil. They ask if circumstances will ever go back to normal. I inform them I am uncertain.

Throughout Gaza, instructors, volunteers and organizations attempt instruction in any feasible location: in tents, destroyed learning spaces, or crowded shelters. Schooling has become an demonstration of perseverance, a way to declare: “We are still here.” And as long as we keep acquiring knowledge, we will remain.

A significant number of us are also caregivers. I am a mother of {three|several