'When education is lost, the future vanishes': Palestinian Children and Educators on 24 Months Without School.

'We don’t want pity, we want action'.

Juwayriya Adwan, twelve, Khan Younis

For the past two years since I entered a learning environment. Two years since I heard the morning bell at Khawla Bint al-Azwar school, took my seat and answered questions during my favourite class. Occasionally I still clearly recall the familiar scents and noises: chalk dust, pencil shavings, laughter echoing down the halls. But my learning place was destroyed; it was bombed shortly after the hostilities erupted. My books were burned, and several classmates lost.

I was in elementary level on 7 October: the last day I entered the school building. That beginning of the day, warning alarms sounded through the corridors. Some children cried, others clasped palms firmly. Our educator attempted reassurance, but even her tone wavered. I remember longing for a normal day; instruction, recess, a verse presentation. Instead, that day marked the end of my old life.

Hostilities have claimed innumerable aspects. But the toughest sacrifice of all is education, because that is the loss of the future itself.

Now I dwell alongside my parents, siblings and female sibling in a crowded shelter in al-Mawasi. The tent walls move with air currents, keeping neither cold nor heat away. We queue for water and food. Power is imaginary and seclusion is unavailable. Aspiration appears brittle.

At darkness, I gaze toward the stars through the openings of my temporary home and wonder if my peers see the same sky. Some contact me when they manage, stating they long for education and have retained their former exercise books; like valuables from a bygone era. I feel remorseful because I’ve lost all of mine.

I once aspired to pursuing pedagogy to assist young residents learn, even when life was hard. Now I aim for being a journalist – to draft, to speak and to demonstrate the world what it means to be a minor in the Strip. I want to narrate our accounts of apprehension and need, but also courage. Because even here, amid death and ruins, our expressions persist.

When there’s some internet, I try to study via the web. On other occasions, I visit a modest shelter where helpers teach us math and Arabic. The sessions are brief – the energy supply stops or the airstrikes begin again but in such times, I experience vitality. I remember who I was: the student who cherished arithmetic and verse, who was convinced learning could change the world.

Hostilities have stolen countless aspects; our homes, schools and families. I mourned my uncle, his partner, and their children. I forfeited my beloved urban area, my previous home, which is nothing but rubble now. But the toughest sacrifice of all is education, because that is the loss of the future itself.

To the international community, I say this: preserve our aspirations. We don’t want pity, we require steps. Gaza’s children deserve texts, learning environments and protection. Schooling is not an extravagance, it is a fundamental entitlement. This region is not only destruction; it is youth who continue to aspire beneath the drones at night. It is my narrative 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, forty, instructor in a refugee camp

I have been teaching in Gaza for a substantial period. Originally in a southern city, then in a different town, and currently in the central camp in the central Gaza Strip. Before the war started, I typically educated six classes of about 40 students each, hundreds of eager students eager to learn.

Teaching them was my vocation and delight in life, and I still recall the gleam in a student’s eyes when a concept was understood; the type of instance every teacher strives for.

I always thought learning should be dynamic. My learning environment was a zone of amusement, creativity, and motion. We created cartographic art, performed past occurrences, and transformed instruction into narratives.

Joy always filled the room as interest displaced anxiety. Certainly, even before the war, young residents were always scared. My teaching space was a protected zone but after 7 October, the situation transformed.

My educational institution became a refuge for relatives running from the explosives. Shortly after, it was targeted and entirely ruined. There are almost no learning institutions still erect in Gaza now. For this period, nothing has been normal. The hostilities has broken every aspect of our lives: protection, homes, schools, dreams. Apprehension and mourning are perpetual experiences.

Numerous of my learners are now lost – minors who talked about becoming medical professionals, creatives, and instructors. They were deprived even the right to exist. Those who remain live with malnutrition, eviction and fatigue – and yet, they still cling to the will to learn.

Occasionally, when the internet permits, I get in touch with a small number of them. They contact inquiring: “How are you, educator?” We exchange concise phrases, abbreviated teaching, minor flashes of connection amid the chaos. They inquire if situations will ever revert to standard. I inform them I am uncertain.

Across this territory, educators, volunteers and charities endeavor education in any feasible location: in temporary structures, destroyed learning spaces, or congested safe zones. Education has become an demonstration of perseverance, a way to express: “We are still here.” And as long as we persist in education, we will endure.

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