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'Our plea is for action, not compassion'.

A young student, 12, Khan Younis

It has been two years since I entered a real classroom. That long since I heard the school chime at Khawla Bint al-Azwar school, sat at my desk and raised my hand during my favourite class. Occasionally I still distinctly recollect the sounds and smells: writing residue, sharpener leftovers, joyful sounds in corridors. But my learning place was destroyed; it was bombed shortly after the hostilities erupted. My learning materials incinerated, and some of my friends killed.

I was in fifth grade on 7 October: the final day I entered the school building. That beginning of the day, air raid sirens blared through the corridors. Some students wept, others clasped palms firmly. Our instructor sought to soothe, but even she sounded shaky. I remember hoping for a routine day; teaching, recess, a literary performance. Instead, that day marked the end of my old life.

Conflict has stolen countless things. But the toughest sacrifice of all is education, because it represents the forfeiture of tomorrow.

Now I dwell alongside my parents, male relatives and female sibling in a crowded shelter in this coastal area. The shelter coverings flap in the wind, keeping neither cold nor heat away. We wait in line for water and food. Power is imaginary and seclusion is unavailable. Hope feels fragile.

At darkness, I observe the stars through the gaps of my shelter and wonder if my companions see the comparable vista. Some contact me when they are able, saying they yearn for classes and have kept their former exercise books; like relics of a vanished time. I feel guilty because I’ve misplaced all of mine.

I once aspired to entering the education field to assist Gaza’s children acquire knowledge, even when life was hard. Now I hope for being a journalist – to write, to communicate and to demonstrate the world what it means to be a child in the Strip. I want to share our experiences of anxiety and deprivation, but also bravery. Because even here, amid fatality and debris, our voices refuse to be silent.

When there’s some internet, I try to study digitally. Sometimes, I attend a modest shelter where aid workers educate us math and Arabic. The sessions are brief – the electricity cuts out or the bombing resumes but in those moments, I sense being. I recall who I was: the young woman who cherished arithmetic and verse, who was convinced knowledge could alter reality.

Hostilities have stolen countless aspects; our residences, educational institutions and families. I mourned my uncle, his wife, and their children. I forfeited my beautiful city, Rafah, which is only ruins now. But the toughest sacrifice of all is schooling, because that is the loss of the future itself.

To the global audience, I state this: keep our hopes alive. We seek no sympathy, we want action. Young residents merit texts, schools and security. Education is not a luxury, it is a basic right. The territory is not just ruins; it is children who still dream beneath the drones at night. It is my story and I will keep drafting, even if the sole items remaining is a broken pencil and a fragment of ripped sheet.

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

An educator, forty, instructor in a refugee camp

I have been instructing in the region for over ten years. First in that urban area, then in another location, and presently in al-Bureij camp in the middle of the territory. Before the war started, I typically educated six classes of about fourty pupils per class, hundreds of eager students eager to learn.

Teaching them was my mission and happiness in reality, and I still remember the sparkle in a pupil's gaze when a concept was understood; the type of instance every instructor lives for.

I always believed learning should be full of life. My classroom was a zone of amusement, art, and activity. We created cartographic art, performed past occurrences, and turned lessons into stories.

Joy always permeated the space as inquisitiveness replaced fear. Yes, even prior to conflict, children in Gaza were always afraid. My classroom was a protected zone but after 7 October, everything changed.

My school became a refuge for relatives running from the explosives. Soon, it was targeted and completely destroyed. There are very few educational facilities remaining intact in Gaza now. For this period, nothing has been normal. The conflict has broken every facet of our lives: safety, residences, learning places, hopes. Anxiety and sorrow are constant companions.

Many of my pupils are now dead – children who talked about becoming medical professionals, artists, and instructors. They were deprived even the right to exist. Those who are still here live with starvation, eviction and weariness – and nevertheless, they still hold onto the thirst for knowledge.

At times, when the online access permits, I get in touch with a handful of them. They contact asking: “How are you, educator?” We exchange short messages, short lessons, small glimmers of contact amid the chaos. They inquire if situations will ever go back to normal. I inform them I don’t know.

Throughout this territory, instructors, helpers and organizations endeavor education wherever possible: in tents, damaged classrooms, or packed refuges. Learning has become an demonstration of perseverance, a way to say: “We persist.” And so long as we continue learning, we will endure.

A significant number of us are also parents. I am a guardian of {three|several