'The loss of education is the loss of the future itself': Gaza's Children and Teachers on Two Years Without Education.

'Our plea is for action, not compassion'.

Juwayriya Adwan, twelve, a temporary shelter

For the past two years since I entered a proper school. That long since I listened to the morning bell at Khawla Bint al-Azwar school, took my seat and answered questions during my beloved lesson. Sometimes I still clearly recall the sounds and smells: powder from the board, pencil shavings, laughter echoing down the halls. But my educational institution is gone; it was struck shortly after the hostilities erupted. My textbooks turned to ash, and companions perished.

I was in the fifth year on that fateful day: the final day I went to school. That morning, warning alarms sounded through the halls. Some students wept, others gripped each other. Our instructor sought to soothe, but even her voice trembled. I remember hoping for a normal day; teaching, intermission, a verse presentation. Instead, that day became the last page of my old life.

Hostilities have claimed innumerable aspects. But the most painful deprivation of all is schooling, because it represents the forfeiture of tomorrow.

Now I reside with my mother and father, male relatives and sister in a congested safe space in this coastal area. The tent walls sway with breezes, failing to insulate. We wait in line for water and food. Electricity is a dream and personal space is absent. Aspiration appears brittle.

At evening, I gaze toward the stars through the holes of my tent and wonder if my companions see the comparable vista. Some contact me when they manage, saying they long for education and have preserved their previous journals; like valuables from a bygone era. I feel guilty because I’ve forfeited all of mine.

I once aspired to becoming a teacher to support local youth learn, even when life was hard. Now I dream of being a reporter – to compose, to speak and to reveal the world what it signifies to be a child in the Strip. I want to narrate our accounts of fear and hunger, but also courage. Because even in this place, amid death and ruins, our voices refuse to be silent.

When there’s some internet, I attempt learning online. Sometimes, I attend a modest shelter where volunteers educate us mathematics and language. The sessions are brief – the energy supply stops or the airstrikes begin again but in those moments, I feel alive. I remember who I was: the student who loved numbers and poems, who thought education could transform society.

Conflict has claimed innumerable things; our dwellings, learning centers and relatives. I grieved for my family member, his spouse, and their young ones. I lost my beautiful city, that southern city, which is merely debris now. But the toughest sacrifice of all is schooling, because without it, our prospects disappear.

To the international community, I say this: don’t let our dreams die. We don’t want pity, we want action. Gaza’s children are entitled to texts, schools and security. Schooling is not an extravagance, it is a essential privilege. This region is not merely devastation; it is youth who still dream beneath the drones at darkness. It is my narrative and I will keep drafting, even if all I have left is a broken pencil and a piece of torn paper.

'Students ask: "Teacher, are you safe?"'.

Naglaa Weshah, forty, instructor in al-Bureij camp

I have been instructing in Gaza for more than a decade. Initially in Khan Younis, then in a different town, and currently in this refugee settlement in the middle of the territory. Before the war started, I regularly instructed multiple groups of about fourty pupils per class, almost two hundred forty individuals keen on education.

Teaching them was my purpose and joy in existence, and I still recall the gleam in a pupil's gaze when a knowledge was acquired; the type of instance every educator strives for.

I always was convinced education should be full of life. My classroom was a space of recreation, creativity, and activity. We designed geographical illustrations, dramatized bygone episodes, and turned lessons into stories.

Laughter always permeated the space as inquisitiveness replaced apprehension. Yes, even in earlier times, young residents were always afraid. My teaching space was a secure location but after 7 October, everything changed.

My learning center became a safe haven for households escaping the aerial attacks. Shortly after, it was targeted and totally demolished. There are almost no learning institutions still erect in this area now. For 24 months, all has been unusual. The conflict has shattered every aspect of our reality: protection, residences, educational centers, dreams. Apprehension and mourning are constant companions.

A significant number of my learners are now dead – minors who mentioned aspiring to be physicians, creatives, and educators. They were denied even the entitlement to survival. Those who are still here experience starvation, displacement and exhaustion – and nevertheless, they still maintain the thirst for knowledge.

Occasionally, when the online access allows, I hear from a small number of them. They write inquiring: “How are you, educator?” We communicate brief words, miniature instruction, tiny sparks of contact amid the turmoil. They inquire if situations will ever revert to standard. I inform them I don’t know.

Throughout Gaza, educators, aid workers and non-profits endeavor education wherever possible: in shelters, ruined educational areas, or congested safe zones. Schooling has become an gesture of resistance, a way to express: “We persist.” And so long as we keep acquiring knowledge, we will endure.

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