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'Our plea is for action, not compassion'.

Juwayriya Adwan, twelve, a temporary shelter

For the past two years since I was last inside a learning environment. Two years since I heard the start-of-class signal at Khawla Bint al-Azwar school, took my seat and participated actively during my favourite class. Sometimes I still distinctly recollect the sounds and smells: powder from the board, pencil shavings, joyful sounds in corridors. But my school no longer exists; it was bombed shortly after the conflict started. My textbooks turned to ash, and some of my friends killed.

I was in the fifth year on 7 October: the last day I attended classes. That beginning of the day, warning alarms sounded through the passageways. Some children cried, others clasped palms firmly. Our instructor sought to soothe, but even she sounded shaky. I remember wishing for a routine day; teaching, intermission, a poem recital. Instead, that day became the last page of my previous existence.

Conflict has stolen countless things. But the most painful deprivation of all is education, because it represents the forfeiture of tomorrow.

Now I live with my mother and father, male relatives and female sibling in a crowded shelter in this coastal area. The tent walls sway with breezes, keeping neither cold nor heat away. We queue for water and food. Electricity is a dream and privacy doesn’t exist. Hope feels fragile.

At evening, I look up at the night lights through the gaps of my temporary home and ponder if my peers see the same sky. Some reach out when they are able, saying they yearn for classes and have preserved their previous journals; like treasures from a lost world. I feel remorseful because I’ve misplaced all of mine.

I once dreamed of entering the education field to assist young residents acquire knowledge, even when life was hard. Now I dream of being a reporter – to compose, to speak and to show the world what it represents to be a young person in Gaza. I want to share our experiences of fear and hunger, but also fortitude. Because even in this place, amid death and ruins, our voices refuse to be silent.

When online access exists, I endeavor to educate myself via the web. Sometimes, I go to a modest shelter where volunteers teach us arithmetic and Arabic. The instruction is limited – the electricity cuts out or the bombing resumes but in those moments, I feel alive. I remember who I was: the young woman who adored mathematics and poetry, who was convinced education could transform society.

Hostilities have stolen countless aspects; our residences, learning centers and kin. I grieved for my family member, his spouse, and their young ones. I said goodbye to my beloved urban area, Rafah, which is merely debris now. But the hardest loss of all is schooling, because that is the loss of the future itself.

To the world, I express this: don’t let our dreams die. Compassion isn't enough, we demand measures. The youth merit texts, learning environments and protection. Learning is not a luxury, it is a essential privilege. This region is not just ruins; it is minors 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 fragment of ripped sheet.

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

Naglaa Weshah, forty, teacher in al-Bureij camp

I have been educating in the region for a substantial period. Originally in Khan Younis, then in another location, and now in al-Bureij camp in the central Gaza Strip. In pre-conflict times, I typically educated several sets of about fourty pupils per class, hundreds of eager students enthusiastic about knowledge.

Teaching them was my mission and happiness in reality, and I still recall the twinkle in a pupil's gaze when a new idea clicked; the sort of occasion every instructor strives for.

I always thought instruction should be full of life. My classroom was a area of recreation, art, and motion. We created cartographic art, performed past occurrences, and turned lessons into stories.

Merriment always permeated the space as curiosity replaced anxiety. Certainly, even before the war, children in Gaza were always scared. My classroom was a protected zone but after the seventh, the situation transformed.

My educational institution became a refuge for households escaping the bombs. Shortly after, it was targeted and totally demolished. There are very few learning institutions left standing in Gaza now. For two years, all has been unusual. The war has broken every aspect of our existence: safety, residences, educational centers, hopes. Anxiety and sorrow are ever-present realities.

Numerous of my learners are now deceased – children who spoke of dreaming of medical professionals, creatives, and teachers. They were refused even the privilege of living. Those who remain experience starvation, displacement and weariness – and nevertheless, they still hold onto the thirst for knowledge.

Occasionally, when the online access permits, I get in touch with a few of them. They message inquiring: “How are you, instructor?” We communicate concise phrases, miniature instruction, small glimmers of contact amid the turmoil. They ask if circumstances will ever go back to normal. I inform them I have no answer.

Throughout this territory, educators, helpers and non-profits attempt instruction wherever possible: in temporary structures, damaged classrooms, or packed refuges. Schooling has become an act of defiance, a way to say: “Our presence continues.” And provided that we persist in education, we will persist.

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