🔗 Share this article

'Our plea is for action, not compassion'.

Juwayriya Adwan, 12, Khan Younis

For the past two years since I was last inside a learning environment. Two years since I listened to the school chime at my former school, occupied my place and raised my hand during my preferred subject. Sometimes I still vividly remember the auditory and olfactory sensations: chalk dust, sharpener leftovers, laughter echoing down the halls. But my school no longer exists; it was bombed not long after the conflict started. My learning materials incinerated, and some of my friends killed.

I was in elementary level on 7 October: the last day I entered the school building. That morning, alert signals blared through the halls. Some students wept, others held hands tightly. Our instructor sought to soothe, but even her voice trembled. I remember longing for a ordinary day; teaching, intermission, a verse presentation. Instead, that day marked the end 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 live with my mother and father, siblings and female sibling in a packed refuge in Khan Younis. The tent walls sway with breezes, providing no climate control. We line up for sustenance and drinks. Electricity is a dream and personal space is absent. Optimism seems delicate.

At night, I observe the celestial bodies through the holes of my temporary home and ponder if my peers see the same sky. Some message me when they are able, saying they miss school and have retained their previous journals; like relics of a vanished time. I feel remorseful because I’ve forfeited all of mine.

I once aspired to becoming a teacher to help local youth study, even when existence was challenging. Now I aim for being a journalist – to write, to speak and to demonstrate the world what it signifies to be a young person in Gaza. I want to narrate our accounts of fear and hunger, but also fortitude. Because even in this place, amid death and ruins, our voices refuse to be silent.

When online access exists, I try to study digitally. Other times, I attend a small tent where aid workers teach us math and Arabic. The instruction is limited – the electricity cuts out or the airstrikes begin again but in those moments, I feel alive. I recall who I was: the young woman who loved numbers and poems, who was convinced education could transform society.

Conflict has claimed innumerable things; our dwellings, schools and families. I mourned my family member, his wife, and their children. I lost my cherished hometown, Rafah, which is only ruins now. But the most painful deprivation of all is schooling, because that is the loss of the future itself.

To the international community, I say this: preserve our aspirations. Compassion isn't enough, we want action. Gaza’s children merit books, learning environments and safety. Education is not optional, it is a essential privilege. This region is not just ruins; it is youth who still dream under aerial surveillance at darkness. It is my narrative and I will persist in composing, even if my only possessions is a broken pencil and a piece of torn paper.

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

Naglaa Weshah, 40, instructor in al-Bureij camp

I have been instructing in this area for a substantial period. First in that urban area, then in a different town, and presently in this refugee settlement in the central Gaza Strip. Before the war started, I regularly instructed multiple groups of about dozens of learners, nearly 240 young minds enthusiastic about knowledge.

Teaching them was my purpose and joy in life, and I still recall the sparkle in a student’s eyes when a new idea clicked; the kind of moment every teacher cherishes.

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

Laughter always occupied the area as inquisitiveness displaced anxiety. Yes, even in earlier times, local youth were always afraid. My learning environment was a protected zone but after 7 October, all was altered.

My school became a shelter for households running from the bombs. Soon, it was targeted and completely destroyed. There are almost no schools still erect in this area now. For 24 months, all has been unusual. The conflict has destroyed every facet of our lives: security, homes, schools, dreams. Apprehension and mourning are perpetual experiences.

Many of my pupils are now dead – children who mentioned dreaming of doctors, artists, and educators. They were denied even the right to exist. Those who are still here live with starvation, relocation and fatigue – and nevertheless, they still maintain the desire for education.

At times, when the internet permits, I hear from a few of them. They contact questioning: “Are you safe, educator?” We share concise phrases, short lessons, minor flashes of interaction amid the disorder. They inquire if circumstances will ever revert to standard. I tell them I don’t know.

Across Gaza, instructors, volunteers and organizations endeavor education in any feasible location: in temporary structures, ruined educational areas, or congested safe zones. Education has become an act of defiance, a way to declare: “We are still here.” And provided that we persist in education, we will endure.

Numerous of us are also parents. I am a mother of {three|several