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'We don’t want pity, we want action'.

Juwayriya Adwan, twelve, al-Mawasi

For the past 24 months since I was last inside a learning environment. That long since I listened to the start-of-class signal at the institution I attended, sat at my desk and raised my hand during my preferred subject. Sometimes I still vividly remember the auditory and olfactory sensations: writing residue, pencil shavings, laughter echoing down the halls. But my educational institution is gone; it was struck soon after the hostilities erupted. My learning materials incinerated, and several classmates lost.

I was in elementary level on that fateful day: the last day I entered the school building. That early hours, alert signals sounded through the passageways. Some pupils sobbed, others held hands tightly. Our teacher tried to calm us, but even she sounded shaky. I remember longing for a ordinary day; lessons, break time, a literary performance. Instead, that day became the last page of my former reality.

Conflict has stolen countless things. But the toughest sacrifice of all is education, because without it, our prospects disappear.

Now I live with my mother and father, male relatives and sister in a congested safe space in Khan Younis. The temporary partitions sway with breezes, failing to insulate. We wait in line for water and food. Electricity is a dream and privacy doesn’t exist. Aspiration appears brittle.

At evening, I look up at the stars through the openings of my shelter and ponder if my friends see the identical heavens. Some message me when they can, stating they miss school and have kept their previous journals; like treasures from a lost world. I feel ashamed because I’ve misplaced all of mine.

I once dreamed of entering the education field to assist local youth study, even when circumstances were difficult. Now I aim for being a journalist – to draft, to communicate and to show the world what it represents to be a child in Gaza. I want to share our experiences of anxiety and deprivation, but also courage. Because even amid these conditions, amid fatality and debris, our expressions persist.

When there’s some internet, I try to study digitally. Other times, I go to a modest shelter where aid workers educate us math and Arabic. The instruction is limited – the energy supply stops or the attacks recommence but in such times, I feel alive. I recollect who I was: the girl who cherished arithmetic and verse, who was convinced knowledge could alter reality.

Hostilities have stolen countless aspects; our residences, learning centers and relatives. I grieved for my paternal relative, his wife, and their children. I said goodbye to my beloved urban area, Rafah, which is nothing but rubble now. But the most painful deprivation of all is education, because that is the loss of the future itself.

To the world, I say this: don’t let our dreams die. We seek no sympathy, we want action. Gaza’s children deserve books, educational facilities and safety. Schooling is not an extravagance, it is a basic right. Gaza is not just ruins; it is children who continue to aspire under aerial surveillance at evening. It is my narrative and I will persist in composing, even if all I have left is a damaged writing tool and a piece of torn paper.

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

An educator, forty, instructor in central Gaza

I have been teaching in this area for more than a decade. Originally in that urban area, then in Deir al-Balah, and now in this refugee settlement in the central Gaza Strip. Prior to hostilities, I typically educated six classes of about 40 students each, almost two hundred forty individuals enthusiastic about knowledge.

Educating them was my vocation and delight in life, and I still recollect the twinkle in a student’s eyes when a knowledge was acquired; the kind of moment every educator lives for.

I always thought learning should be dynamic. My classroom was a area of play, aesthetics, and movement. We painted maps, performed past occurrences, and converted teaching into tales.

Merriment always occupied the area as curiosity replaced fear. Indeed, even in earlier times, young residents were always afraid. My learning environment was a secure location but after the seventh, all was altered.

My educational institution became a refuge for households running from the aerial attacks. Soon, it was struck and totally demolished. There are very few educational facilities left standing in Gaza now. For two years, everything has been abnormal. The war has broken every part of our lives: protection, residences, educational centers, hopes. Apprehension and mourning are constant companions.

A significant number of my pupils are now dead – children who mentioned becoming physicians, painters, and teachers. They were deprived even the right to exist. Those who remain live with starvation, relocation and weariness – and however, they still cling to the thirst for knowledge.

Sometimes, when the internet enables, I hear from a few of them. They contact asking: “Are you OK, instructor?” We communicate brief words, short lessons, tiny sparks of interaction amid the disorder. They ask if circumstances will ever revert to standard. I state to them I don’t know.

All over Gaza, instructors, aid workers and non-profits endeavor education wherever possible: in temporary structures, destroyed learning spaces, or congested safe zones. Learning has become an demonstration of perseverance, a way to express: “Our presence continues.” And so long as we persist in education, we will remain.

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