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'Our plea is for action, not compassion'.

Juwayriya Adwan, twelve, al-Mawasi

It has been two years since I was last inside a real classroom. Two years since I heard the start-of-class signal at my former school, took my seat and raised my hand during my favourite class. At times 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 soon after the hostilities erupted. My books were burned, and some of my friends killed.

I was in fifth grade on 7 October: the concluding day I entered the school building. That beginning of the day, alert signals screamed through the passageways. Some children cried, others gripped each other. Our teacher tried to calm us, but even her tone wavered. I remember longing for a ordinary day; teaching, intermission, a verse presentation. Instead, that day became the last page of my former reality.

The war has taken so much. But the toughest sacrifice of all is education, because that is the loss of the future itself.

Now I reside with my mother and father, two brothers and female sibling in a packed refuge in Khan Younis. The temporary partitions flap in the wind, providing no climate control. We line up for nourishment and hydration. Electricity is a dream and seclusion is unavailable. Aspiration appears brittle.

At darkness, I observe the celestial bodies through the gaps of my temporary home and wonder if my companions see the comparable vista. Some message me when they manage, saying they yearn for classes and have retained their previous journals; like valuables from a bygone era. I feel remorseful because I’ve misplaced all of mine.

I once envisioned pursuing pedagogy to assist local youth study, even when circumstances were difficult. Now I aim for being a reporter – to draft, to communicate and to show the world what it signifies to be a young person in this region. I want to tell our stories of anxiety and deprivation, but also bravery. Because even amid these conditions, amid death and ruins, our voices refuse to be silent.

When online access exists, I try to study digitally. Sometimes, I go to a tiny space where helpers instruct us arithmetic and Arabic. The instruction is limited – the energy supply stops or the bombing resumes but in these instances, I feel alive. I remember who I was: the girl who cherished arithmetic and verse, who believed education could transform society.

Hostilities have stolen countless aspects; our dwellings, learning centers and relatives. I mourned my family member, his wife, and their offspring. I forfeited my cherished hometown, my previous home, which is only ruins now. But the toughest sacrifice of all is learning, because without it, our prospects disappear.

To the global audience, I express this: keep our hopes alive. Compassion isn't enough, we demand measures. Gaza’s children merit literature, learning environments and safety. Schooling is not optional, it is a basic right. This region is not merely devastation; it is youth who still dream amid unmanned aircraft at night. It is my account and I will continue writing, even if all I have left is a broken pencil and a scrap of damaged material.

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

Naglaa Weshah, forty, instructor in al-Bureij camp

I have been teaching in the region for over ten years. First in that urban area, then in a different town, and presently in al-Bureij camp in the central Gaza Strip. Prior to hostilities, I regularly instructed six classes of about fourty pupils per class, hundreds of eager students keen on education.

Instructing them was my vocation and delight in reality, and I still recollect the sparkle in a pupil's gaze when a concept was understood; the kind of moment every instructor lives for.

I always believed education should be vibrant. My classroom was a space of recreation, aesthetics, and motion. We painted maps, acted out historical events, and transformed instruction into narratives.

Laughter always occupied the area as interest substituted fear. Yes, even before the war, children in Gaza were always scared. My learning environment was a protected zone but after that day, everything changed.

My educational institution became a safe haven for households escaping the bombs. Shortly after, it was struck and completely destroyed. There are hardly any learning institutions left standing in Gaza now. For this period, everything has been abnormal. The conflict has shattered every part of our lives: security, residences, learning places, hopes. Anxiety and sorrow are constant companions.

Numerous of my pupils are now deceased – youth who spoke of becoming physicians, artists, and instructors. They were denied even the privilege of living. Those who are still here endure hunger, displacement and exhaustion – and nevertheless, they still cling to the thirst for knowledge.

Sometimes, when the connectivity enables, I hear from a few of them. They write inquiring: “How are you, instructor?” We share brief words, short lessons, tiny sparks of contact amid the disorder. They ask if situations will ever return to usual. I inform them I am uncertain.

Across Gaza, teachers, aid workers and organizations try to teach wherever possible: in temporary structures, damaged classrooms, or crowded shelters. Education has become an gesture of resistance, a way to declare: “We are still here.” And so long as we persist in education, we will endure.

Many of us are also parents. I am a parent of {three|several