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'We seek action, not sympathy'.

A young student, twelve, a temporary shelter

It has been two years since I stepped into a real classroom. Two years since I heard the morning bell at Khawla Bint al-Azwar school, took my seat and participated actively during my beloved lesson. At times I still distinctly recollect the familiar scents and noises: writing residue, wooden scraps, joyful sounds in corridors. But my educational institution is gone; it was struck shortly after the conflict started. My books were burned, and several classmates lost.

I was in the fifth year on that fateful day: the concluding day I attended classes. That early hours, warning alarms screamed through the passageways. Some students wept, others clasped palms firmly. Our educator attempted reassurance, but even her voice trembled. I remember hoping for a normal day; instruction, break time, a verse presentation. Instead, that day marked the end of my former reality.

Conflict has stolen countless things. But the hardest loss of all is schooling, because without it, our prospects disappear.

Now I dwell alongside my mother and father, male relatives and sister in a congested safe space in al-Mawasi. The tent walls move with air currents, providing no climate control. We queue for water and food. Power is imaginary and seclusion is unavailable. Aspiration appears brittle.

At darkness, I look up at the stars through the openings of my temporary home and question if my peers see the same sky. Some contact me when they can, saying they long for education and have kept their old notebooks; like valuables from a bygone era. I feel guilty because I’ve lost all of mine.

I once envisioned pursuing pedagogy to support young residents learn, even when life was hard. Now I dream of being a reporter – to write, to communicate and to show the world what it signifies to be a young person in the Strip. I want to share our experiences of anxiety and deprivation, but also bravery. Because even in this place, amid fatality and debris, our voices refuse to be silent.

When connectivity is available, I try to study digitally. Other times, I go to a small tent where helpers instruct us mathematics and language. The instruction is limited – the electricity cuts out or the bombing resumes but in these instances, I feel alive. I recollect who I was: the girl who adored mathematics and poetry, who thought education could transform society.

Conflict has claimed innumerable things; our homes, schools and kin. I lost my paternal relative, his wife, and their offspring. I said goodbye to my cherished hometown, Rafah, which is only ruins now. But the most painful deprivation of all is education, because without it, our prospects disappear.

To the global audience, I state this: keep our hopes alive. Compassion isn't enough, we require steps. The youth are entitled to books, schools and safety. Learning is not an extravagance, it is a fundamental entitlement. The territory is not only destruction; it is minors who continue to aspire beneath the drones at night. It is my account and I will persist in composing, even if all I have left is a broken pencil and a scrap of damaged material.

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

An educator, 40, instructor in central Gaza

I have been instructing in this area for more than a decade. First in Khan Younis, then in a different town, and currently in this refugee settlement in the central Gaza Strip. In pre-conflict times, I typically educated multiple groups of about 40 students each, almost two hundred forty individuals keen on education.

Teaching them was my mission and happiness in existence, and I still recall the sparkle in a learner's look when a concept was understood; the kind of moment every teacher lives for.

I always thought instruction should be dynamic. My teaching space was a zone of recreation, aesthetics, and movement. We painted maps, acted out historical events, and transformed instruction into narratives.

Laughter always permeated the space as curiosity replaced apprehension. Indeed, even in earlier times, children in Gaza were always scared. My learning environment was a place of safety but after 7 October, the situation transformed.

My educational institution became a safe haven for relatives running from the explosives. Not long later, it was targeted and totally demolished. There are almost no schools still erect in Gaza now. For two years, all has been unusual. The conflict has broken every aspect of our reality: safety, homes, learning places, dreams. Fear and grief are perpetual experiences.

A significant number of my learners are now deceased – children who mentioned becoming physicians, artists, and instructors. They were refused even the right to exist. Those who remain experience starvation, displacement and fatigue – and however, they still hold onto the will to learn.

Sometimes, when the internet enables, I receive messages from a handful of them. They contact inquiring: “Are you OK, instructor?” We exchange short messages, miniature instruction, minor flashes of interaction amid the chaos. They question if situations will ever go back to normal. I inform them I am uncertain.

Across this territory, instructors, volunteers and non-profits attempt instruction wherever possible: in tents, damaged classrooms, or crowded shelters. Learning has become an demonstration of perseverance, a way to declare: “We persist.” And provided that we persist in education, we will remain.

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