'When education is lost, the future vanishes': Gaza's Youth and Teachers on Two Years Deprived of School.

'Our plea is for action, not compassion'.

A young student, 12, a temporary shelter

For the past two years since I entered a proper school. Two years since I heard the start-of-class signal at the institution I attended, sat at my desk and answered questions during my beloved lesson. Sometimes I still vividly remember the auditory and olfactory sensations: writing residue, pencil shavings, laughter echoing down the halls. But my learning place was destroyed; it was targeted shortly after the war began. My learning materials incinerated, and several classmates lost.

I was in elementary level on the seventh of October: the concluding day I went to school. That beginning of the day, alert signals screamed through the passageways. Some children cried, others clasped palms firmly. Our instructor sought to soothe, but even her voice trembled. I remember wishing for a normal day; teaching, break time, a literary performance. Instead, that day became the last page of my former reality.

Conflict has stolen countless things. But the most painful deprivation of all is schooling, because without it, our prospects disappear.

Now I reside with my parents, two brothers and sister in a packed refuge in this coastal area. The shelter coverings move with air currents, failing to insulate. We queue for nourishment and hydration. Energy access is fantasy and personal space is absent. Optimism seems delicate.

At evening, I gaze toward the stars through the holes of my shelter and wonder if my friends see the comparable vista. Some reach out when they manage, saying they yearn for classes and have retained their former exercise books; like treasures from a lost world. I feel ashamed because I’ve lost all of mine.

I once envisioned entering the education field to support local youth learn, even when existence was challenging. Now I aim for being a reporter – to write, to speak and to show the world what it signifies to be a minor in this region. I want to tell our stories of apprehension and need, but also fortitude. Because even amid these conditions, amid loss and destruction, our words continue.

When connectivity is available, I try to study online. Other times, I visit a modest shelter where helpers educate us math and Arabic. The sessions are brief – the energy supply stops or the airstrikes begin again but in these instances, I feel alive. I recollect who I was: the young woman who loved numbers and poems, who believed learning could change the world.

Conflict has claimed innumerable things; our residences, educational institutions and kin. I grieved for my family member, his wife, and their young ones. I lost my cherished hometown, my previous home, which is only ruins now. But the toughest sacrifice of all is schooling, because that is the loss of the future itself.

To the international community, I say this: don’t let our dreams die. We don’t want pity, we want action. Young residents are entitled to texts, educational facilities and safety. Education is not a luxury, it is a fundamental entitlement. The territory is not just ruins; it is youth who still dream amid unmanned aircraft at darkness. It is my narrative and I will persist in composing, even if all I have left is a damaged writing tool and a fragment of ripped sheet.

'They message: "are you OK, teacher?"'.

An educator, forty, instructor in central Gaza

I have been teaching in this area for over ten years. Initially in a southern city, then in another location, and currently in this refugee settlement in the heart of the region. Prior to hostilities, I regularly instructed six classes of about dozens of learners, nearly 240 young minds eager to learn.

Educating them was my purpose and joy in existence, and I still remember the twinkle in a pupil's gaze when a concept was understood; the type of instance every educator cherishes.

I always was convinced instruction should be vibrant. My learning environment was a space of amusement, creativity, and motion. We created cartographic art, acted out historical events, and converted teaching into tales.

Merriment always filled the room as inquisitiveness substituted apprehension. Indeed, even before the war, young residents were always scared. My teaching space was a place of safety but after the seventh, the situation transformed.

My educational institution became a shelter for relatives fleeing the explosives. Soon, it was struck and entirely ruined. There are hardly any educational facilities remaining intact in this area now. For this period, nothing has been normal. The conflict has broken every aspect of our lives: protection, residences, schools, aspirations. Anxiety and sorrow are perpetual experiences.

Many of my pupils are now deceased – minors who talked about becoming medical professionals, painters, and teachers. They were refused even the entitlement to survival. Those who are still here experience malnutrition, displacement and fatigue – and yet, they still cling to the desire for education.

At times, when the online access permits, I get in touch with a small number of them. They message asking: “Are you OK, teacher?” We exchange short messages, short lessons, minor flashes of interaction amid the disorder. They question if situations will ever return to usual. I inform them I don’t know.

Throughout the region, educators, aid workers and non-profits attempt instruction in any feasible location: in temporary structures, ruined educational areas, or crowded shelters. Learning has become an act of defiance, a way to say: “Our presence continues.” And provided that we persist in education, we will remain.

A significant number of us are also caregivers. I am a mother of {three|several