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'Our plea is for action, not compassion'.

Juwayriya Adwan, 12, al-Mawasi

For the past two years since I entered a learning environment. That long since I listened to the morning bell at my former school, took my seat and participated actively during my favourite class. Occasionally I still distinctly recollect the auditory and olfactory sensations: powder from the board, sharpener leftovers, laughter echoing down the halls. But my learning place was destroyed; it was struck shortly after the conflict started. My textbooks turned to ash, and companions perished.

I was in elementary level on the seventh of October: the last day I entered the school building. That early hours, air raid sirens screamed through the halls. Some pupils sobbed, others held hands tightly. Our teacher tried to calm us, but even her tone wavered. I remember hoping for a routine day; lessons, break time, a literary performance. Instead, that day became the last page of my previous existence.

Hostilities have claimed innumerable aspects. But the hardest loss of all is schooling, because without it, our prospects disappear.

Now I live with my guardians, male relatives and female sibling in a congested safe space in Khan Younis. The shelter coverings sway with breezes, providing no climate control. We line up for water and food. Electricity is a dream and personal space is absent. Hope feels fragile.

At evening, I look up at the night lights through the gaps of my temporary home and wonder if my companions see the same sky. Some reach out when they are able, stating they miss school and have preserved their previous journals; like treasures from a lost world. I feel ashamed because I’ve lost all of mine.

I once dreamed of becoming a teacher to support local youth acquire knowledge, even when circumstances were difficult. Now I aim for being a journalist – to write, to communicate and to demonstrate the world what it represents to be a young person in Gaza. I want to share our experiences of anxiety and deprivation, but also fortitude. Because even in this place, amid fatality and debris, our expressions persist.

When online access exists, I try to study online. Other times, I visit a small tent where helpers instruct us mathematics and language. The lessons are short – the energy supply stops or the bombing resumes but in such times, I sense being. I recollect who I was: the student who cherished arithmetic and verse, who was convinced education could transform society.

Conflict has claimed innumerable things; our residences, schools and relatives. I mourned my paternal relative, his wife, and their young ones. I said goodbye to my beloved urban area, my previous home, which is nothing but rubble now. But the toughest sacrifice of all is education, because without it, our prospects disappear.

To the international community, I say this: don’t let our dreams die. We seek no sympathy, we want action. The youth deserve literature, educational facilities and security. Learning is not optional, it is a fundamental entitlement. This region is not merely devastation; it is children who still dream amid unmanned aircraft at night. It is my narrative and I will keep drafting, even if the sole items remaining is a fractured utensil and a piece of torn paper.

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

Naglaa Weshah, 40, instructor in al-Bureij camp

I have been educating in this area for more than a decade. Initially in a southern city, then in Deir al-Balah, and currently in this refugee settlement in the heart of the region. In pre-conflict times, I regularly instructed several sets of about fourty pupils per class, almost two hundred forty individuals keen on education.

Instructing them was my purpose and joy in life, and I still recollect the gleam in a pupil's gaze when a concept was understood; the type of instance every instructor strives for.

I always believed instruction should be dynamic. My classroom was a zone of amusement, creativity, and movement. We painted maps, performed past occurrences, and converted teaching into tales.

Joy always permeated the space as interest displaced anxiety. Indeed, even before the war, local youth were always frightened. My learning environment was a secure location but after 7 October, all was altered.

My school became a shelter for families escaping the explosives. Shortly after, it was struck and totally demolished. There are almost no schools still erect in this area now. For 24 months, all has been unusual. The hostilities has broken every part of our reality: safety, residences, schools, aspirations. Fear and grief are perpetual experiences.

Numerous of my pupils are now deceased – minors who talked about aspiring to be physicians, artists, and teachers. They were deprived even the privilege of living. Those who survive live with malnutrition, relocation and fatigue – and yet, they still cling to the thirst for knowledge.

Occasionally, when the internet enables, I get in touch with a handful of them. They message inquiring: “Are you safe, instructor?” We share brief words, miniature instruction, minor flashes of contact amid the turmoil. They question if circumstances will ever return to usual. I inform them I am uncertain.

All over this territory, teachers, helpers and organizations attempt instruction in any feasible location: in shelters, damaged classrooms, or congested safe zones. Schooling has become an act of defiance, a way to say: “We persist.” And as long as we keep acquiring knowledge, we will remain.

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