🔗 Share this article

'We don’t want pity, we want action'.

A young student, 12, Khan Younis

For the past two years since I was last inside a proper school. That long since I heard the school chime at Khawla Bint al-Azwar school, took my seat and raised my hand during my preferred subject. Occasionally I still distinctly recollect the sounds and smells: powder from the board, sharpener leftovers, laughter echoing down the halls. But my school no longer exists; it was struck shortly after the conflict started. My textbooks turned to ash, and some of my friends killed.

I was in the fifth year on that fateful day: the concluding day I entered the school building. That early hours, warning alarms sounded through the passageways. Some pupils sobbed, others gripped each other. Our teacher tried to calm us, but even her tone wavered. I remember wishing for a ordinary day; lessons, recess, a poem recital. Instead, that day became the last page of my former reality.

Hostilities have claimed innumerable aspects. But the toughest sacrifice of all is learning, because without it, our prospects disappear.

Now I reside with my parents, siblings and sister in a packed refuge in this coastal area. The temporary partitions flap in the wind, failing to insulate. We wait in line for nourishment and hydration. Energy access is fantasy and personal space is absent. Optimism seems delicate.

At night, I look up at the stars through the gaps of my shelter and ponder if my friends see the same sky. Some reach out when they can, expressing they miss school and have retained their former exercise books; like treasures from a lost world. I feel remorseful because I’ve forfeited all of mine.

I once envisioned entering the education field to help Gaza’s children study, even when life was hard. Now I dream of being a reporter – to write, to communicate and to reveal the world what it signifies to be a minor in this region. I want to share our experiences of apprehension and need, but also bravery. Because even in this place, amid loss and destruction, our voices refuse to be silent.

When connectivity is available, I endeavor to educate myself via the web. Other times, I attend a small tent where volunteers teach us mathematics and language. The lessons are short – the power fails or the attacks recommence but in such times, I experience vitality. I recall who I was: the young woman who loved numbers and poems, who thought learning could change the world.

The war has taken so much; our residences, schools and families. I lost my family member, his spouse, and their offspring. I forfeited my cherished hometown, that southern city, which is only ruins now. But the hardest loss of all is education, because without it, our prospects disappear.

To the international community, I state this: don’t let our dreams die. We seek no sympathy, we demand measures. Young residents deserve texts, schools and safety. Learning is not an extravagance, it is a fundamental entitlement. The territory is not merely devastation; it is children who persist in hoping under aerial surveillance at night. It is my account and I will keep drafting, even if all I have left is a damaged writing tool and a fragment of ripped sheet.

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

Naglaa Weshah, forty, teacher in a refugee camp

I have been teaching in this area for over ten years. Initially in that urban area, then in Deir al-Balah, and currently in al-Bureij camp in the central Gaza Strip. Prior to hostilities, I regularly instructed six classes of about 40 students each, nearly 240 young minds enthusiastic about knowledge.

Teaching them was my purpose and joy in existence, and I still recollect the sparkle in a pupil's gaze when a concept was understood; the sort of occasion every educator lives for.

I always was convinced learning should be dynamic. My learning environment was a area of amusement, art, and activity. We designed geographical illustrations, acted out historical events, and turned lessons into stories.

Joy always occupied the area as inquisitiveness replaced fear. Indeed, even in earlier times, children in Gaza were always scared. My classroom was a place of safety but after that day, all was altered.

My learning center became a shelter for households fleeing the explosives. Not long later, it was targeted and entirely ruined. There are hardly any learning institutions remaining intact in this area now. For this period, everything has been abnormal. The conflict has broken every part of our lives: protection, dwellings, educational centers, hopes. Anxiety and sorrow are perpetual experiences.

Numerous of my learners are now dead – minors who spoke of aspiring to be physicians, painters, and educators. They were denied even the right to exist. Those who are still here endure starvation, displacement and weariness – and however, they still cling to the desire for education.

Occasionally, when the internet permits, I receive messages from a handful of them. They write inquiring: “Are you OK, instructor?” We share short messages, short lessons, tiny sparks of contact amid the disorder. They ask if circumstances will ever go back to normal. I state to them I don’t know.

All over Gaza, teachers, helpers and charities try to teach wherever possible: in shelters, ruined educational areas, or packed refuges. Schooling has become an demonstration of perseverance, a way to say: “We persist.” And as long as we keep acquiring knowledge, we will endure.

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