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'We seek action, not sympathy'.

Juwayriya Adwan, 12, a temporary shelter

It has been two years since I entered a real classroom. That long since I heard the school chime at the institution I attended, took my seat and participated actively during my beloved lesson. Sometimes I still vividly remember the familiar scents and noises: chalk dust, pencil shavings, joyful sounds in corridors. But my learning place was destroyed; it was bombed not long after the war began. My books were burned, and several classmates lost.

I was in elementary level on the seventh of October: the concluding day I entered the school building. That beginning of the day, alert signals screamed through the passageways. Some children cried, others clasped palms firmly. Our teacher tried to calm us, but even she sounded shaky. I remember wishing for a normal day; teaching, break time, a literary performance. Instead, that day signaled the conclusion of my old life.

Hostilities have claimed innumerable aspects. But the toughest sacrifice of all is learning, because it represents the forfeiture of tomorrow.

Now I dwell alongside my parents, two brothers and female sibling in a crowded shelter in al-Mawasi. The temporary partitions move with air currents, keeping neither cold nor heat away. We wait in line for sustenance and drinks. Electricity is a dream and privacy doesn’t exist. Optimism seems delicate.

At evening, I look up at the celestial bodies through the gaps of my tent and ponder if my companions see the identical heavens. Some reach out when they are able, stating they miss school and have preserved their previous journals; like valuables from a bygone era. I feel ashamed because I’ve misplaced all of mine.

I once dreamed of entering the education field to help young residents acquire knowledge, even when existence was challenging. Now I dream of being a reporter – to draft, to talk and to show the world what it represents to be a minor in Gaza. I want to narrate our accounts of anxiety and deprivation, but also courage. Because even amid these conditions, amid fatality and debris, our words continue.

When connectivity is available, I attempt learning online. Sometimes, I attend a tiny space where helpers instruct us mathematics and language. The sessions are brief – the power fails or the airstrikes begin again but in those moments, I sense being. I remember who I was: the student who adored mathematics and poetry, who thought learning could change the world.

The war has taken so much; our homes, educational institutions and families. I mourned my family member, his partner, and their children. I said goodbye to my beautiful city, Rafah, which is only ruins now. But the hardest loss of all is schooling, because that is the loss of the future itself.

To the world, I say this: preserve our aspirations. We don’t want pity, we demand measures. Gaza’s children merit texts, learning environments and protection. Learning is not optional, it is a basic right. Gaza is not only destruction; it is children who continue to aspire amid unmanned aircraft at evening. It is my account and I will persist in composing, even if all I have left is a damaged writing tool and a fragment of ripped sheet.

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

An educator, forty, instructor in al-Bureij camp

I have been teaching in the region for more than a decade. First in Khan Younis, then in a different town, and presently in the central camp in the middle of the territory. Before the war started, I regularly instructed multiple groups of about dozens of learners, hundreds of eager students keen on education.

Educating them was my vocation and delight in life, and I still recall the twinkle in a pupil's gaze when a new idea clicked; the kind of moment every instructor cherishes.

I always believed learning should be dynamic. My learning environment was a space of play, art, and movement. We created cartographic art, dramatized bygone episodes, and turned lessons into stories.

Joy always filled the room as inquisitiveness displaced fear. Indeed, even in earlier times, local youth were always frightened. My classroom was a secure location but after the seventh, all was altered.

My educational institution became a refuge for relatives running from the bombs. Shortly after, it was attacked and entirely ruined. There are almost no schools left standing in this area now. For 24 months, all has been unusual. The conflict has broken every facet of our reality: safety, residences, educational centers, hopes. Anxiety and sorrow are constant companions.

A significant number of my pupils are now deceased – youth who talked about aspiring to be medical professionals, artists, and instructors. They were denied even the entitlement to survival. Those who survive experience starvation, displacement and weariness – and yet, they still maintain the will to learn.

Occasionally, when the connectivity allows, I get in touch with a small number of them. They contact questioning: “Are you safe, instructor?” We exchange concise phrases, abbreviated teaching, minor flashes of interaction amid the chaos. They ask if things will ever revert to standard. I state to them I have no answer.

All over Gaza, educators, volunteers and non-profits attempt instruction wherever possible: in tents, damaged classrooms, or packed refuges. Learning has become an demonstration of perseverance, a way to say: “Our presence continues.” And as long as we persist in education, we will persist.

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