Teacher Shot in Lower Back Mid-Lesson as Israeli Fire Hits Gaza Tent Schools

Sahar Abushbeika was explaining a science lesson to her third-grade class when a bullet struck her lower back. She collapsed in front of her students, who gathered around her screaming.

Abushbeika teaches at Dawn of Hope, a tent school in eastern Khan Younis built for children displaced by nearly three years of war. She told Middle East Eye she was shot by Israeli forces on 30 September.

"I felt something hit my lower back and realised it was a bullet. The pupils panicked, and I tried to calm them down, but they saw the blood, and I fell to the ground."

She said she heard a drone and a small explosion moments before being hit. Doctors hospitalized her but could not remove the bullet, which lodged in a sensitive area of her back. She now struggles to walk or sit, according to her account to MEE. She told the outlet she was not prioritized for medical evacuation because thousands of other patients were judged more urgent.

Abushbeika, a mother of five, volunteered to teach at the school near the tent where she now lives after being displaced from her home in Khan Younis. The classroom has no tables or chairs; pupils sit on the ground while she stands to teach. "The bullet penetrated the tent and hit me directly," she said.

A second child struck weeks later

About three weeks after Abushbeika was shot, nine-year-old Amir Abusneimah was sitting in class at a school run by the US-registered charity Gaza Children Village, also in eastern Khan Younis, when a bullet pierced the tent, struck the blackboard near the teacher's head, and ricocheted into his shoulder.

His mother, Muna Abusneimah, told MEE the school called her after administering first aid. "The bullet came close to his heart," she said. When she arrived, her son tried to reassure her: "Don't worry, Mum, I'm fine. God was kind to me."

Doctors at Nasser Hospital found that one of Amir's arteries had been severed and performed roughly four hours of surgery. He is stable but needs physiotherapy and has stopped attending school while he recovers, his mother said.

The school sits roughly two to three kilometres from Israel's so-called Yellow Line and had sand barriers built around its tents for protection, according to Abusneimah. Days after Amir was wounded, MEE was told by an unnamed source that a bullet pierced the school's administration room and struck a cupboard while the headteacher was inside; that detail has not been independently corroborated.

Universities hit as classes resume

This school year marked the first attempt at something close to normal instruction in Gaza since October 2023, with the Ministry of Education, UNRWA and independent groups running tent schools after Israeli attacks destroyed or damaged more than 97 percent of Gaza's schools, according to MEE. Many children now get only about three hours of lessons, three days a week.

Less than two months into the term, strikes have again disrupted classes. An Israeli air strike hit the entrance to the University College of Applied Sciences in Mawasi Khan Younis, killing three Palestinians and wounding 11, including students, according to MEE reporting. The same day, 16-year-old student Rimas Ismail al-Madhoun was killed in a strike shortly after leaving school in Gaza City. On 25 October, two strikes hit the courtyard of the Islamic University in Gaza City, killing three security guards and wounding several others, including students.