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'Our plea is for action, not compassion'.

A young student, 12, a temporary shelter

It has been two years since I was last inside a learning environment. That long since I listened to the school chime at the institution I attended, occupied my place and raised my hand during my beloved lesson. Sometimes I still distinctly recollect the familiar scents and noises: powder from the board, pencil shavings, cheerful echoes. But my school no longer exists; it was bombed shortly after the hostilities erupted. My textbooks turned to ash, and some of my friends killed.

I was in the fifth year on that fateful day: the final day I entered the school building. That morning, warning alarms blared through the passageways. Some children cried, others held hands tightly. Our instructor sought to soothe, but even her voice trembled. I remember wishing for a ordinary day; instruction, intermission, a poem recital. Instead, that day signaled the conclusion of my old life.

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

Now I live with my parents, two brothers and sister in a packed refuge in Khan Younis. The tent walls sway with breezes, providing no climate control. We queue for water and food. Power is imaginary and privacy doesn’t exist. Hope feels fragile.

At night, I look up at the night lights through the holes of my shelter and ponder if my companions see the same sky. Some message me when they can, stating they miss school and have kept their old notebooks; like relics of a vanished time. I feel remorseful because I’ve forfeited all of mine.

I once envisioned pursuing pedagogy to support young residents learn, even when circumstances were difficult. Now I hope for being a writer – to compose, to speak and to reveal the world what it represents to be a young person in Gaza. I want to share our experiences of anxiety and deprivation, but also courage. Because even here, amid loss and destruction, our voices refuse to be silent.

When connectivity is available, I attempt learning online. Sometimes, I visit a modest shelter where helpers educate us mathematics and language. The sessions are brief – the electricity cuts out or the attacks recommence but in those moments, I sense being. I recall who I was: the young woman who adored mathematics and poetry, who was convinced education could transform society.

Conflict has claimed innumerable things; our homes, schools and relatives. I mourned my uncle, his spouse, and their children. I lost my beloved urban area, that southern city, which is merely debris now. But the most painful deprivation of all is education, because that is the loss of the future itself.

To the global audience, I express this: don’t let our dreams die. We seek no sympathy, we demand measures. The youth deserve literature, learning environments and safety. Learning is not a luxury, it is a fundamental entitlement. This region is not just ruins; it is youth who continue to aspire amid unmanned aircraft at darkness. It is my account and I will keep drafting, even if the sole items remaining is a fractured utensil and a fragment of ripped sheet.

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

An educator, 40, instructor in al-Bureij camp

I have been teaching in Gaza for a substantial period. Originally in a southern city, then in another location, and currently in al-Bureij camp in the heart of the region. Prior to hostilities, I typically educated six classes of about fourty pupils per class, nearly 240 young minds keen on education.

Teaching them was my vocation and delight in existence, and I still recollect the sparkle in a student’s eyes when a concept was understood; the kind of moment every educator strives for.

I always believed instruction should be vibrant. My teaching space was a zone of recreation, creativity, and movement. We created cartographic art, dramatized bygone episodes, and converted teaching into tales.

Laughter always occupied the area as inquisitiveness replaced apprehension. Certainly, even in earlier times, young residents were always afraid. My teaching space was a secure location but after that day, the situation transformed.

My school became a refuge for families running from the explosives. Not long later, it was targeted and entirely ruined. There are very few educational facilities left standing in this area now. For two years, all has been unusual. The conflict has shattered every facet of our reality: safety, residences, schools, hopes. Fear and grief are ever-present realities.

Many of my pupils are now deceased – youth who spoke of aspiring to be medical professionals, creatives, and educators. They were deprived even the right to exist. Those who survive endure starvation, eviction and exhaustion – and nevertheless, they still hold onto the thirst for knowledge.

Occasionally, when the connectivity enables, I hear from a handful of them. They write questioning: “Are you OK, teacher?” We communicate concise phrases, short lessons, minor flashes of contact amid the chaos. They inquire if circumstances will ever revert to standard. I inform them I don’t know.

Across this territory, teachers, aid workers and organizations attempt instruction in any feasible location: in tents, damaged classrooms, or packed refuges. Schooling has become an gesture of resistance, a way to declare: “We are still here.” And as long as we keep acquiring knowledge, we will remain.

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