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'We seek action, not sympathy'.

Juwayriya Adwan, twelve, al-Mawasi

It has been two years since I entered a real classroom. Two years since I listened to the school chime at the institution I attended, sat at my desk and participated actively during my beloved lesson. Sometimes I still vividly remember the auditory and olfactory sensations: chalk dust, pencil shavings, joyful sounds in corridors. But my learning place was destroyed; it was targeted shortly after the hostilities erupted. My books were burned, and several classmates lost.

I was in fifth grade on that fateful day: the final day I went to school. That early hours, alert signals sounded through the halls. Some pupils sobbed, others gripped each other. Our instructor sought to soothe, but even she sounded shaky. I remember wishing for a ordinary day; lessons, intermission, a verse presentation. Instead, that day became the last page of my former reality.

Conflict has stolen countless things. But the toughest sacrifice of all is schooling, because it represents the forfeiture of tomorrow.

Now I reside with my parents, two brothers and sister in a crowded shelter in this coastal area. The shelter coverings flap in the wind, keeping neither cold nor heat away. We queue for water and food. Power is imaginary and seclusion is unavailable. Hope feels fragile.

At evening, I look up at the night lights through the gaps of my temporary home and question if my friends see the identical heavens. Some reach out when they can, stating they miss school and have kept their old notebooks; like relics of a vanished time. I feel guilty because I’ve lost all of mine.

I once aspired to becoming a teacher to help local youth acquire knowledge, even when life was hard. Now I aim for being a journalist – to draft, to talk and to show the world what it signifies to be a child in this region. I want to narrate our accounts of fear and hunger, but also courage. Because even in this place, amid fatality and debris, our expressions persist.

When connectivity is available, I endeavor to educate myself digitally. Sometimes, I go to a modest shelter where volunteers instruct us arithmetic and Arabic. The lessons are short – the electricity cuts out or the airstrikes begin again but in such times, I sense being. I remember who I was: the student who loved numbers and poems, who thought knowledge could alter reality.

The war has taken so much; our residences, educational institutions and families. I lost my uncle, his spouse, and their children. I forfeited my cherished hometown, my previous home, which is nothing but rubble now. But the toughest sacrifice of all is education, 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 deserve books, learning environments and safety. Learning is not a luxury, it is a basic right. Gaza is not just ruins; it is minors who persist in hoping under aerial surveillance at darkness. It is my story and I will keep drafting, even if the sole items remaining is a broken pencil and a fragment of ripped sheet.

'Pupils inquire: "Are you alright, educator?"'.

Naglaa Weshah, 40, instructor in al-Bureij camp

I have been teaching in this area for a substantial period. First in a southern city, then in another location, and presently in al-Bureij camp in the middle of the territory. In pre-conflict times, I used to teach multiple groups of about fourty pupils per class, almost two hundred forty individuals eager to learn.

Teaching them was my vocation and delight in life, and I still remember the gleam in a student’s eyes when a new idea clicked; the type of instance every educator cherishes.

I always was convinced learning should be dynamic. My teaching space was a zone of recreation, art, and movement. We designed geographical illustrations, acted out historical events, and converted teaching into tales.

Joy always filled the room as inquisitiveness replaced fear. Indeed, even before the war, young residents were always afraid. My teaching space was a place of safety but after the seventh, all was altered.

My educational institution became a refuge for households fleeing the bombs. Shortly after, it was struck and completely destroyed. There are very few schools still erect in Gaza now. For two years, nothing has been normal. The conflict has destroyed every aspect of our existence: safety, dwellings, schools, hopes. Anxiety and sorrow are constant companions.

A significant number of my students are now lost – youth who mentioned becoming doctors, painters, and instructors. They were denied even the right to exist. Those who remain experience hunger, displacement and exhaustion – and yet, they still hold onto the desire for education.

At times, when the online access permits, I hear from a few of them. They write questioning: “Are you safe, instructor?” We share concise phrases, miniature instruction, minor flashes of interaction amid the turmoil. They question if circumstances will ever return to usual. I inform them I don’t know.

Throughout the region, educators, aid workers and non-profits try to teach in any feasible location: in tents, damaged classrooms, or congested safe zones. Education has become an demonstration of perseverance, a way to declare: “Our presence continues.” And so long as we keep acquiring knowledge, we will persist.

A significant number of us are also guardians. I am a guardian of {three|several