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'Our plea is for action, not compassion'.

A young student, twelve, al-Mawasi

For the past 24 months since I stepped into a real classroom. That long since I heard the school chime at Khawla Bint al-Azwar school, occupied my place and participated actively during my preferred subject. Sometimes I still distinctly recollect the familiar scents and noises: chalk dust, pencil shavings, cheerful echoes. But my school no longer exists; it was bombed shortly after the hostilities erupted. My learning materials incinerated, and companions perished.

I was in fifth grade on that fateful day: the last day I attended classes. That beginning of the day, alert signals screamed through the corridors. Some children cried, others gripped each other. Our teacher tried to calm us, but even she sounded shaky. I remember wishing for a normal day; teaching, break time, a poem recital. Instead, that day signaled the conclusion of my former reality.

Conflict has stolen countless things. But the hardest loss of all is learning, because it represents the forfeiture of tomorrow.

Now I dwell alongside my guardians, male relatives and female sibling in a crowded shelter in al-Mawasi. The temporary partitions sway with breezes, providing no climate control. We queue for sustenance and drinks. Energy access is fantasy and seclusion is unavailable. Optimism seems delicate.

At evening, I observe the stars through the holes of my shelter and ponder if my companions see the identical heavens. Some contact me when they are able, saying they long for education and have preserved their former exercise books; like relics of a vanished time. I feel ashamed because I’ve forfeited all of mine.

I once dreamed of entering the education field to assist young residents study, even when life was hard. Now I dream of being a writer – to draft, to talk and to show the world what it represents to be a young person in Gaza. I want to narrate our accounts of fear and hunger, but also bravery. Because even here, amid death and ruins, our expressions persist.

When online access exists, I endeavor to educate myself via the web. Other times, I visit a tiny space where aid workers instruct us mathematics and language. The sessions are brief – the energy supply stops or the attacks recommence but in such times, I sense being. I recollect who I was: the girl who cherished arithmetic and verse, who was convinced knowledge could alter reality.

Hostilities have stolen countless aspects; our residences, educational institutions and kin. I lost my family member, his partner, and their offspring. I said goodbye to my beautiful city, Rafah, which is merely debris now. But the toughest sacrifice of all is schooling, because that is the loss of the future itself.

To the global audience, I express this: keep our hopes alive. Compassion isn't enough, we require steps. Gaza’s children are entitled to texts, educational facilities and security. Learning is not optional, it is a basic right. The territory is not merely devastation; it is minors who continue to aspire under aerial surveillance at darkness. It is my account and I will continue writing, even if my only possessions is a broken pencil and a fragment of ripped sheet.

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

An educator, 40, teacher in a refugee camp

I have been teaching in Gaza for more than a decade. First in Khan Younis, then in another location, and currently in this refugee settlement in the middle of the territory. Before the war started, I used to teach six classes of about dozens of learners, nearly 240 young minds eager to learn.

Instructing them was my vocation and delight in existence, and I still recall the sparkle in a pupil's gaze when a new idea clicked; the sort of occasion every teacher strives for.

I always believed education should be dynamic. My learning environment was a area of amusement, art, and activity. We created cartographic art, dramatized bygone episodes, and transformed instruction into narratives.

Merriment always filled the room as interest substituted apprehension. Yes, even in earlier times, young residents were always afraid. My classroom was a place of safety but after the seventh, all was altered.

My learning center became a refuge for relatives fleeing the explosives. Soon, it was attacked and completely destroyed. There are hardly any learning institutions still erect in this area now. For this period, everything has been abnormal. The conflict has shattered every part of our lives: protection, dwellings, learning places, dreams. Apprehension and mourning are perpetual experiences.

Many of my learners are now lost – children who talked about aspiring to be physicians, painters, and teachers. They were refused even the entitlement to survival. Those who remain endure malnutrition, displacement and fatigue – and however, they still maintain the desire for education.

At times, when the online access permits, I get in touch with a few of them. They message questioning: “Are you safe, educator?” We exchange short messages, short lessons, minor flashes of connection amid the turmoil. They question if situations will ever go back to normal. I inform them I am uncertain.

Throughout Gaza, instructors, helpers and charities try to teach in all available spaces: in tents, ruined educational areas, or crowded shelters. Learning has become an act of defiance, a way to declare: “We are still here.” And so long as we persist in education, we will endure.

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