Abu Zueiter: 80% of Gaza schools out of service and about 127,000 students out of education

The Director of Education in East Gaza, Munir Abu Zueiter, said that about 80% of schools in the Gaza Strip are out of service due to the destruction that affected educational institutions during the war, stressing that the educational process faces an unprecedented catastrophe as a result of targeting schools and destroying the elements of education. Abu Zueiter, within the program "Nabd Ghaza" organized by the newspaper "Filastin", explained that the Gaza Strip had about 584 school buildings of various types, including government, UNRWA, and private, noting that about 307 schools were destroyed or their fate is unknown, while about 161 schools suffered total or partial destruction. He added that only about 21% of classrooms are still suitable for education, while most existing schools have turned into shelters for displaced people, stressing that Gaza City has hardly benefited from any classroom due to the continued use of schools as shelters. Abu Zueiter showed that the war left heavy human losses among the educational family, as about 535 male and female teachers were martyred out of about 22,000 in the Gaza Strip, while about 20,000 male and female students of school age were martyred. He pointed out that about 19,500 students left the Gaza Strip due to the war conditions, which affected the numbers of students enrolled in the educational process and increased the challenges facing educational institutions. Abu Zueiter said that educational authorities, in light of the destruction of schools, were forced to search for alternatives to accommodate students, including establishing field educational points and schools inside shelters and residential neighborhoods, using tents and primitive building materials. He added that e-learning formed another option for the continuation of the educational process, with about 84,000 male and female students enrolled, but weak internet, power outages, lack of devices, and their high prices, along with repeated displacement and bombing, prevented larger numbers from enrolling. He explained that the strategic option during the next phase is temporary field schools in parallel with e-learning, aiming to reach as many students as possible, stressing that e-learning will not be canceled, but rather will be integrated with face-to-face education. Abu Zueiter pointed out that about 400,000 male and female students enrolled in the newly established schools during the past academic year, whether in the yards of destroyed schools or inside residential neighborhoods, noting that about 55% of these schools were set up in tents. He added that field schools, despite their simplicity, managed to accommodate the largest number of students, given the difficulty of building alternative school buildings due to high cost and difficult field and humanitarian conditions. He noted that the percentage of students enrolled in e-learning reached about 14%, while about 127,000 male and female students remain outside the educational process, whether face-to-face or e-learning, at a rate of about 20.5%. Abu Zueiter stressed that the new academic year in the Gaza Strip is expected to start on September 6, 2026, in agreement with the Ministry of Education in Ramallah, while continuing to work on providing educational alternatives that guarantee students' right to access education despite the continued repercussions of the war. He stressed that the scale of destruction that affected schools and educational facilities and the loss of large numbers of teachers and students represents a major challenge to rebuilding the educational process, stressing the need to provide alternatives and capabilities to accommodate students and return them to school desks.