🔗 Share this article

'We seek action, not sympathy'.

A young student, twelve, Khan Younis

It has been two years since I entered a proper school. Two years since I listened to the morning bell at the institution I attended, sat at my desk and participated actively during my preferred subject. At times I still distinctly recollect the auditory and olfactory sensations: powder from the board, sharpener leftovers, laughter echoing down the halls. But my learning place was destroyed; it was targeted not long after the war began. My learning materials incinerated, and some of my friends killed.

I was in the fifth year on 7 October: the concluding day I entered the school building. That beginning of the day, alert signals screamed through the corridors. Some children cried, others held hands tightly. Our teacher tried to calm us, but even her voice trembled. I remember hoping for a normal day; teaching, recess, a poem recital. Instead, that day became the last page of my former reality.

Conflict has stolen countless things. But the hardest loss of all is education, because that is the loss of the future itself.

Now I dwell alongside my mother and father, two brothers and sister in a crowded shelter in this coastal area. The tent walls flap in the wind, failing to insulate. We line up for water and food. Electricity is a dream and privacy doesn’t exist. Aspiration appears brittle.

At evening, I look up at the night lights through the holes of my shelter and wonder if my companions see the comparable vista. Some message me when they can, expressing they long for education and have kept their old notebooks; like treasures from a lost world. I feel remorseful because I’ve lost all of mine.

I once dreamed of entering the education field to support Gaza’s children acquire knowledge, even when existence was challenging. Now I hope for being a writer – to compose, to talk and to demonstrate the world what it signifies to be a child in the Strip. I want to narrate our accounts of anxiety and deprivation, but also bravery. Because even amid these conditions, amid fatality and debris, our words continue.

When connectivity is available, I endeavor to educate myself via the web. On other occasions, I go to a small tent where aid workers educate us mathematics and language. The lessons are short – the electricity cuts out or the bombing resumes but in these instances, I feel alive. I remember who I was: the student who adored mathematics and poetry, who thought learning could change the world.

Conflict has claimed innumerable things; our residences, schools and kin. I lost my uncle, his spouse, and their young ones. I said goodbye to my cherished hometown, that southern city, which is merely debris now. But the most painful deprivation of all is schooling, because that is the loss of the future itself.

To the global audience, I say this: don’t let our dreams die. We seek no sympathy, we want action. Young residents deserve literature, educational facilities and protection. Learning is not a luxury, it is a basic right. Gaza is not only destruction; it is minors who persist in hoping under aerial surveillance at evening. It is my account and I will continue writing, even if all I have left is a broken pencil and a piece of torn paper.

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

Naglaa Weshah, 40, teacher in central Gaza

I have been teaching in the region for over ten years. Originally in that urban area, then in a different town, and presently in this refugee settlement in the central Gaza Strip. Prior to hostilities, I regularly instructed six classes of about 40 students each, nearly 240 young minds eager to learn.

Teaching them was my vocation and delight in reality, and I still recall the gleam in a pupil's gaze when a concept was understood; the kind of moment every teacher strives for.

I always believed learning should be vibrant. My learning environment was a zone of play, creativity, and movement. We painted maps, acted out historical events, and turned lessons into stories.

Joy always permeated the space as interest displaced apprehension. Yes, even in earlier times, local youth were always scared. My teaching space was a secure location but after the seventh, everything changed.

My educational institution became a safe haven for households fleeing the aerial attacks. Shortly after, it was attacked and totally demolished. There are almost no educational facilities remaining intact in the region now. For two years, everything has been abnormal. The war has broken every part of our lives: protection, dwellings, educational centers, dreams. Apprehension and mourning are constant companions.

A significant number of my students are now deceased – youth who mentioned dreaming of medical professionals, creatives, and educators. They were refused even the entitlement to survival. Those who remain endure starvation, displacement and fatigue – and however, they still cling to the desire for education.

Occasionally, when the internet enables, I get in touch with a small number of them. They contact inquiring: “Are you OK, instructor?” We communicate short messages, miniature instruction, tiny sparks of connection amid the turmoil. They inquire if situations will ever revert to standard. I state to them I have no answer.

Throughout Gaza, educators, helpers and charities attempt instruction in all available spaces: in temporary structures, ruined educational areas, or crowded shelters. Schooling has become an demonstration of perseverance, a way to declare: “We persist.” And so long as we continue learning, we will persist.

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