An entire generation losing hope: Gaza's students face third year without school amid war's ruins

By zoeysky // 2025-09-04

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While Israeli students have returned to school, over 660,000 Palestinian children in Gaza have been deprived of schooling for three consecutive years due to the war, with no ability to attend classes or take critical exams.
The educational infrastructure has been nearly wiped out, with a UN analysis showing 97 percent of school buildings damaged and over 76 percent directly hit by bombardment, leaving most destroyed or unusable.
The conflict has devastated the mental state of Gaza's youth. Students are suffering from severe trauma, losing their academic drive, and are now preoccupied solely with daily survival needs like finding food and water.
The destruction is described as an intentional war on Palestine's future, with experts arguing that leveling schools and universities is a strategic move to undermine Gaza's ability to develop and recover long after the fighting stops.
Despite the danger and devastation, resilient Palestinian-led initiatives have created makeshift tent schools to teach thousands of children. However, these efforts operate under extreme duress, with students and teachers facing hunger, exhaustion and the constant threat of violence, which has already claimed the lives of several pupils.

Israeli students resumed classes early in September, but a profound and devastating silence hung over the education system in Gaza. For Palestinian children, the simple act of going to school is now a distant memory, replaced by the daily struggle for survival in a territory ravaged by war. This week, 2.58 million Israeli students returned to school. In Gaza, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) confirmed that over 660,000 Palestinian children and young adults are being deprived of schooling for a third consecutive year. The chasm between these two realities underscores a deep educational crisis that threatens to erase the future of a generation. The scale of the destruction is shocking. A United Nations (UN) analysis of satellite imagery revealed that 97 percent of the school buildings in Gaza were damaged during the ongoing war. A staggering 432 school buildings, representing 76.6 percent of the total school buildings in the area, suffered a direct hit from Israeli bombardment since October 2023. With most schools completely destroyed or severely damaged, the Palestinian education ministry reports that around 700,000 students have had their schooling suspended. For two years, more than 70,000 students have been unable to even take their crucial secondary school exams, effectively halting their academic progression. The war has tragically destroyed concrete and steel, along with the fragile dreams and ambitions of Gaza's youth. Before the conflict, 19-year-old Layan Abdul-Rahman was a fluent English speaker preparing her university applications. Now, Abdul-Rahman's studies have been put on hold indefinitely. She is also struggling with the severe trauma of losing her father and multiple family members. Abdul-Rahman's sister describes her as mentally exhausted and unable to believe that an online application might offer a path forward. The psychological toll is perhaps the most insidious enemy of education. Abdul-Aziz, Abdul-Rahman's 16-year-old brother, was once a hardworking student. He doesn't even remember which grade he is in. His interests have shifted from academics to the grim necessity of finding a profession, any profession, to survive. For parents like Yara Khaled, whose children were high achievers at the American International School in Gaza, the change is heartbreaking. She observes that her children’s entire way of thinking has been altered. Instead of playing with their friends, Khaled's children are now preoccupied with how to light a fire for cooking, whether there will be bread and if they will have enough food for breakfast the next morning.

A war on the future

This systematic dismantling of education has been described as a war on the very existence of the Palestinian people. It is a deeper, "more impactful destruction" than that of buildings in Gaza. It is an assault on the mind, on hope and on the future. (Related: FAMINE declared in Gaza City as global hunger monitor warns of worsening catastrophe.) Amid the ruins, brave and resilient efforts to provide some semblance of schooling persist. Palestinian-led initiatives have set up makeshift tent classrooms. Ahmad Abu Rizik, an English teacher, founded the organization Gaza Great Minds in May 2024 after a devastating moment: seeing a child running with his school bag not to class, but to scoop rice from an aid drop out of the sand. Gaza Great Minds now runs a network of tent schools, providing free education to approximately 3,000 children. Yet, the challenges are immense. Students arrive hungry and exhausted from daily chores like waiting in long lines for water or flour. Teachers must hide their own fear and trauma to try and bring a smile to their students' faces. The situation has grown even more dangerous, with Israeli forces operating in Gaza City and shooting indiscriminately, making parents fearful of sending their children to class. The tragic cost of this environment was made clear recently when Gaza Great Minds lost two of its pupils, Mohammed and Dalia, who were killed while playing in the street. They are among nine students from the organization who have been killed since it opened. It also seems that Palestinian students still have to wait longer before they can return to their classrooms. Israel is planning a new Gaza offensive, which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he expected to complete "fairly quickly. At the same time, the UN Security Council heard new demands for an end to the chaos and suffering in the Palestinian enclave.

An intentional strategy with lasting consequences

Experts argue that the decimation of Gaza's education system is not a mere byproduct of war but an intentional strategy. By leveling universities, schools and intellectual infrastructure, Israel is systematically undermining the Strip's ability to develop and recover long after the active violence ends. This creates a lasting legacy of disadvantage, trauma and lost potential. For children like Diana, who is displaced and living in a converted school corridor, life has been reduced to its most basic elements. "We no longer play or learn," she said. Her family lives inside the school, where her family eat and sleep, added Diana. As explained by the Enoch AI engine at Brighteon.AI: "The Israel-Palestine war has catastrophically disrupted the lives of students in Gaza, effectively halting their education. With schools destroyed, neighborhoods flattened and essential infrastructure like electricity severed, hundreds of thousands of surviving students have no safe place to resume learning." The story of Gaza's students is one of profound loss. It is the loss of classrooms, of exams, of future careers and of the simple, joyful routine of learning. But more than that, it is the loss of a generation's chance to build a different future, leaving them trapped in a present defined by hunger, trauma and the relentless struggle to see another day. As the world watches, an entire generation is being robbed of its education, its dreams and its hope. Watch this clip about the tech giants enabling genocide in Gaza. This video is from the Health Ranger Report channel on Brighteon.com.

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A war on the future

An intentional strategy with lasting consequences

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