🔗 Share this article

'We don’t want pity, we want action'.

A young student, twelve, Khan Younis

It has been 24 months since I was last inside a real classroom. That long since I heard the morning bell at the institution I attended, occupied my place and raised my hand during my favourite class. Occasionally I still distinctly recollect the familiar scents and noises: writing residue, wooden scraps, laughter echoing down the halls. But my educational institution is gone; it was bombed soon after the hostilities erupted. My learning materials incinerated, and several classmates lost.

I was in the fifth year on 7 October: the final day I attended classes. That beginning of the day, alert signals sounded through the halls. Some students wept, others clasped palms firmly. Our educator attempted reassurance, but even she sounded shaky. I remember longing for a normal day; teaching, recess, a poem recital. Instead, that day marked the end of my former reality.

The war has taken so much. But the toughest sacrifice of all is schooling, because without it, our prospects disappear.

Now I dwell alongside my parents, siblings and sister in a congested safe space in al-Mawasi. The shelter coverings flap in the wind, failing to insulate. We wait in line for nourishment and hydration. Electricity is a dream and seclusion is unavailable. Hope feels fragile.

At evening, I gaze toward the stars through the openings of my tent and wonder if my companions see the same sky. Some contact me when they can, expressing they miss school and have preserved their former exercise books; like relics of a vanished time. I feel ashamed because I’ve misplaced all of mine.

I once dreamed of becoming a teacher to help local youth acquire knowledge, even when life was hard. Now I aim for being a journalist – to draft, to speak and to reveal the world what it represents to be a minor in the Strip. I want to narrate our accounts of fear and hunger, but also fortitude. Because even amid these conditions, amid fatality and debris, our voices refuse to be silent.

When there’s some internet, I endeavor to educate myself via the web. Other times, I go to a tiny space where aid workers educate us arithmetic and Arabic. The sessions are brief – the energy supply stops or the bombing resumes but in those moments, I experience vitality. I recall who I was: the girl who loved numbers and poems, who believed education could transform society.

Conflict has claimed innumerable things; our residences, schools and families. I grieved for my family member, his spouse, and their offspring. I said goodbye to my cherished hometown, that southern city, which is nothing but rubble now. But the most painful deprivation of all is learning, because without it, our prospects disappear.

To the international community, I say this: keep our hopes alive. We don’t want pity, we demand measures. The youth merit books, schools and safety. Education is not an extravagance, it is a fundamental entitlement. The territory is not only destruction; it is children who persist in hoping amid unmanned aircraft at night. It is my story and I will continue writing, even if my only possessions is a broken pencil and a scrap of damaged material.

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

Naglaa Weshah, 40, instructor in central Gaza

I have been instructing in the region for a substantial period. Originally in that urban area, then in Deir al-Balah, and presently in this refugee settlement in the central Gaza Strip. In pre-conflict times, I typically educated six classes of about 40 students each, nearly 240 young minds keen on education.

Instructing them was my mission and happiness in reality, and I still remember the gleam in a learner's look when a new idea clicked; the type of instance every instructor strives for.

I always believed education should be dynamic. My learning environment was a area of recreation, art, and activity. We created cartographic art, acted out historical events, and turned lessons into stories.

Joy always filled the room as curiosity substituted apprehension. Yes, even before the war, children in Gaza were always frightened. My teaching space was a place of safety but after 7 October, all was altered.

My school became a safe haven for families running from the explosives. Not long later, it was struck and totally demolished. There are very few learning institutions remaining intact in this area now. For two years, nothing has been normal. The war has destroyed every part of our reality: security, dwellings, educational centers, dreams. Apprehension and mourning are ever-present realities.

A significant number of my learners are now dead – minors who talked about aspiring to be medical professionals, painters, and educators. They were denied even the right to exist. Those who remain live with hunger, eviction and weariness – and yet, they still hold onto the will to learn.

Occasionally, when the online access allows, I get in touch with a few of them. They message asking: “Are you safe, instructor?” We exchange concise phrases, miniature instruction, tiny sparks of contact amid the turmoil. They inquire if things will ever revert to standard. I state to them I have no answer.

Throughout the region, teachers, aid workers and charities endeavor education in all available spaces: in shelters, ruined educational areas, or packed refuges. Schooling has become an act of defiance, a way to express: “We persist.” And as long as we continue learning, we will remain.

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