Three Years Without School: Gaza’s Children Return to Class, carrying a Childhood Interrupted

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip /PNN /

For the first time in three years, Gaza’s children are returning to classrooms.But there are few signs of the back-to-school season they once knew.

The new academic year began Saturday with students returning to in-person education in parts of the Gaza Strip, after years of disruption caused by the war. Schools are reopening with only the most basic resources available, while families and educators try to restore a sense of routine in a place where so much of everyday life has been upended.

The Palestinian Ministry of Education and Higher Education said the 2026-2027 school year would begin under an education plan designed to accommodate students facing different circumstances inside and outside Gaza.

Rather than relying on a single system, the ministry has introduced two tracks: in-person education for students in Gaza who are able to reach schools, and virtual education for students outside the territory and those inside Gaza whose circumstances prevent them from attending classes in person.

The new school year officially began Saturday, Sept. 19, under what the ministry described as a flexible arrangement tailored to the extraordinary conditions facing the territory.

Students are required to attend their daily lessons in full, while the ministry has prohibited simultaneous registration in both in-person and virtual schools.

A School Year Rebuilt Around Extraordinary Circumstances

As part of preparations for the virtual system, the ministry held a pilot opening Thursday, Sept. 17, from 4:30 to 5 p.m.

The virtual schools have also been reorganised into three categories: Gaza Secondary, Gaza Upper Basic and Gaza Lower Basic.

For many families, however, the return to education is about far more than reopening classrooms. It is also about trying to recover a childhood routine that has been interrupted for years.

‘She Forgot What School Means’

A PNN field report from Gaza found that the preparations for the new school year bear little resemblance to those of the past.

The familiar rush to buy backpacks, notebooks and stationery has been replaced by shortages, sharply higher prices and difficult choices for parents struggling to meet even basic household needs.

For families with several children, the cost of preparing for school can be overwhelming.

Ahmed Ashraf al-Qreinawi, a father of three, said his daughter has been away from school for so long that the idea itself has become unfamiliar to her.

“I started taking my daughter to school, and she asked me, ‘What does school mean?’ She forgot about schools,” he said.

Before the war, the start of the school year brought a sense of excitement to families, he said. Children would look forward to new bags, notebooks and books and the return to their classrooms.

“Before the war, we used to see the back-to-school atmosphere. The children would go out happy, wanting backpacks, notebooks and books,” al-Qreinawi said.

Now, that familiar excitement has largely disappeared.

For Gaza’s children, returning to school after three years is therefore both a new beginning and a reminder of what has been lost. The classrooms may be opening again, but restoring the ordinary experience of childhood — the anticipation of a new school bag, the excitement of seeing classmates and the feeling of starting a new year — remains a far greater challenge.