'When education is lost, the future vanishes': Gaza's Children and Teachers on 24 Months Without School.

'Our plea is for action, not compassion'.

A young student, 12, al-Mawasi

It has been two years since I stepped into a real classroom. Two years since I heard the start-of-class signal at the institution I attended, occupied my place and answered questions during my preferred subject. Occasionally I still vividly remember the familiar scents and noises: chalk dust, sharpener leftovers, joyful sounds in corridors. But my learning place was destroyed; it was bombed soon after the war began. My learning materials incinerated, and several classmates lost.

I was in the fifth year on 7 October: the last day I went to school. That morning, alert signals blared through the corridors. Some children cried, others gripped each other. Our instructor sought to soothe, but even she sounded shaky. I remember longing for a ordinary day; teaching, break time, a verse presentation. Instead, that day marked the end of my previous existence.

The war has taken so much. But the hardest loss of all is schooling, because it represents the forfeiture of tomorrow.

Now I reside with my mother and father, two brothers and female sibling in a packed refuge in Khan Younis. The tent walls flap in the wind, failing to insulate. We queue for sustenance and drinks. Power is imaginary and seclusion is unavailable. Aspiration appears brittle.

At evening, I observe the night lights through the gaps of my tent and ponder if my friends see the comparable vista. Some message me when they are able, saying they long for education and have preserved their old notebooks; like treasures from a lost world. I feel guilty because I’ve misplaced all of mine.

I once aspired to entering the education field to help young residents acquire knowledge, even when existence was challenging. Now I hope for being a journalist – to draft, to talk and to reveal the world what it means to be a child in the Strip. I want to share our experiences of apprehension and need, but also fortitude. Because even in this place, amid loss and destruction, our voices refuse to be silent.

When connectivity is available, I endeavor to educate myself digitally. Sometimes, I visit a tiny space where helpers educate us arithmetic and Arabic. The lessons are short – the power fails or the attacks recommence but in these instances, I feel alive. I recall who I was: the girl who adored mathematics and poetry, who thought education could transform society.

Conflict has claimed innumerable things; our dwellings, schools and relatives. I lost my paternal relative, his wife, and their young ones. I lost my cherished hometown, my previous home, which is merely debris now. But the hardest loss of all is education, because without it, our prospects disappear.

To the world, I say this: preserve our aspirations. We don’t want pity, we demand measures. The youth deserve books, learning environments and protection. Schooling is not an extravagance, it is a essential privilege. The territory is not just ruins; it is minors who still dream beneath the drones at evening. It is my story and I will persist in composing, even if my only possessions is a broken pencil and a piece of torn paper.

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

Naglaa Weshah, 40, instructor in a refugee camp

I have been educating in Gaza for a substantial period. Initially in that urban area, then in another location, and now in the central camp in the middle of the territory. Prior to hostilities, I typically educated several sets of about 40 students each, hundreds of eager students eager to learn.

Instructing them was my vocation and delight in existence, and I still recollect the twinkle in a learner's look when a new idea clicked; the type of instance every educator lives for.

I always believed instruction should be full of life. My teaching space was a space of recreation, art, and movement. We designed geographical illustrations, performed past occurrences, and transformed instruction into narratives.

Merriment always filled the room as interest substituted fear. Yes, even in earlier times, local youth were always afraid. My classroom was a secure location but after the seventh, all was altered.

My school became a shelter for households running from the aerial attacks. Shortly after, it was struck and entirely ruined. There are almost no educational facilities remaining intact in Gaza now. For two years, nothing has been normal. The conflict has shattered every part of our reality: security, residences, schools, dreams. Fear and grief are ever-present realities.

Many of my students are now deceased – youth who spoke of becoming medical professionals, artists, and teachers. They were deprived even the privilege of living. Those who survive experience hunger, displacement and weariness – and yet, they still maintain the will to learn.

Sometimes, when the connectivity allows, I hear from a small number of them. They write asking: “Are you safe, teacher?” We share short messages, abbreviated teaching, small glimmers of contact amid the chaos. They inquire if situations will ever go back to normal. I tell them I am uncertain.

Across this territory, educators, helpers and non-profits attempt instruction in all available spaces: in tents, damaged classrooms, or congested safe zones. Learning has become an demonstration of perseverance, a way to express: “We persist.” And as long as we persist in education, we will endure.

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