🔗 Share this article

'We seek action, not sympathy'.

Juwayriya Adwan, twelve, a temporary shelter

It has been 24 months since I entered a learning environment. Two years since I heard the school chime at the institution I attended, took my seat and raised my hand during my beloved lesson. Occasionally I still distinctly recollect the auditory and olfactory sensations: chalk dust, pencil shavings, joyful sounds in corridors. But my school no longer exists; it was targeted not long after the war began. My books were burned, and several classmates lost.

I was in elementary level on 7 October: the concluding day I went to school. That beginning of the day, alert signals sounded through the passageways. Some children cried, others clasped palms firmly. Our teacher tried to calm us, but even her voice trembled. I remember hoping for a normal day; instruction, recess, a literary performance. Instead, that day became the last page of my old life.

The war has taken so much. But the toughest sacrifice of all is learning, because that is the loss of the future itself.

Now I dwell alongside my guardians, siblings and female sibling in a congested safe space in al-Mawasi. The temporary partitions move with air currents, keeping neither cold nor heat away. We wait in line for nourishment and hydration. Energy access is fantasy and personal space is absent. Optimism seems delicate.

At evening, I gaze toward the celestial bodies through the gaps of my tent and wonder if my peers see the same sky. Some message me when they can, stating they long for education and have preserved their previous journals; like treasures from a lost world. I feel guilty because I’ve misplaced all of mine.

I once dreamed of pursuing pedagogy to assist Gaza’s children learn, even when existence was challenging. Now I aim 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 share our experiences of fear and hunger, but also courage. Because even amid these conditions, amid loss and destruction, our words continue.

When there’s some internet, I attempt learning via the web. Other times, I attend a tiny space where aid workers teach us mathematics and language. The sessions are brief – the power fails or the bombing resumes but in these instances, I feel alive. I recall who I was: the student who loved numbers and poems, who believed learning could change the world.

Conflict has claimed innumerable things; our dwellings, educational institutions and families. I lost my paternal relative, his spouse, and their young ones. I said goodbye to my beloved urban area, my previous home, which is merely debris now. But the toughest sacrifice of all is education, because that is the loss of the future itself.

To the international community, I state this: preserve our aspirations. Compassion isn't enough, we require steps. Young residents are entitled to texts, educational facilities and safety. Schooling is not a luxury, it is a basic right. The territory is not only destruction; it is children who still dream amid unmanned aircraft at night. It is my account and I will continue writing, even if all I have left is a damaged writing tool and a piece of torn paper.

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

An educator, forty, instructor in central Gaza

I have been instructing in the region for more than a decade. Originally in a southern city, then in a different town, and currently in this refugee settlement in the central Gaza Strip. In pre-conflict times, I typically educated multiple groups of about dozens of learners, nearly 240 young minds keen on education.

Educating them was my mission and happiness in reality, and I still recollect the twinkle in a pupil's gaze when a new idea clicked; the type of instance every educator cherishes.

I always believed learning should be dynamic. My teaching space was a area of recreation, art, and movement. We created cartographic art, acted out historical events, and turned lessons into stories.

Merriment always occupied the area as curiosity substituted anxiety. Certainly, even prior to conflict, local youth were always afraid. My classroom was a protected zone but after the seventh, everything changed.

My school became a safe haven for families escaping the explosives. Shortly after, it was struck and entirely ruined. There are almost no learning institutions remaining intact in Gaza now. For this period, everything has been abnormal. The conflict has destroyed every aspect of our reality: security, homes, schools, dreams. Anxiety and sorrow are constant companions.

Numerous of my pupils are now deceased – minors who talked about becoming physicians, painters, and instructors. They were refused even the right to exist. Those who are still here live with malnutrition, relocation and weariness – and nevertheless, they still maintain the desire for education.

Occasionally, when the online access permits, I get in touch with a handful of them. They contact inquiring: “Are you OK, instructor?” We exchange brief words, short lessons, minor flashes of contact amid the turmoil. They inquire if circumstances will ever revert to standard. I tell them I have no answer.

Throughout Gaza, teachers, volunteers and non-profits endeavor education in any feasible location: in shelters, damaged classrooms, or congested safe zones. Schooling has become an act of defiance, a way to declare: “We are still here.” And so long as we keep acquiring knowledge, we will remain.

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