Private schools become a costly choice for struggling parents in Gaza

Deir el-Balah, Gaza Strip — In their tent in central Gaza, Khadija Abu Qados gets her 11-year-old daughter, Jouri, ready for another day at school amid the ongoing Israeli air raids and crippling financial crisis.

The family has been living in a camp for displaced Palestinians in Deir el-Balah since their neighbourhood, Sheikh Radwan, in northern Gaza, was destroyed in the Israeli offensive in Gaza City last September.

Like their home, the classrooms for Jouri and her 14-year-old sister, Ritaj, at Elyaa’ School are also tents. There are few chairs or desks, so children usually sit on mattresses and carpets when they learn. There is no air conditioning or fans, so the heat makes it difficult for children to focus.

The children have already spent long periods out of school since Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza began in October 2023. Online classes were a challenge due to difficulties in internet access during Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza.

Now, Jouri and two of her siblings attend a nearby school run by volunteer teachers near their camp, which charges 30 shekels ($8) a month. Even though it is far cheaper than private schools, the modest fee is difficult for the family to afford when food, water and other basic needs come first.

“If I could afford it, I would send them to private school,” 39-year-old Khadija told Al Jazeera.

Before the war, her daughters attended an UNRWA school in Gaza City, where her children performed well and were praised for their achievements.

Now, she watches them study in tents. The conditions may be difficult, but the teachers are helping her children catch up with missed school time.

“The teaching here is excellent [but] I feel sad for my children because they are studying in these difficult circumstances. There are no chairs and no proper seats. This is not an educational environment at all,” she said.

“Even the stationery is something I can barely afford because prices have become so high. A single notebook costs between four and six shekels.”

The family’s experiences reflect a wider education crisis in Gaza after nearly three years of war.

Around 700,000 children aged between four and 17 had missed formal, face-to-face schooling for almost three consecutive school years during Israel’s war on Gaza, UNICEF said in May.

Just two percent of all school buildings are undamaged and 93 percent of them require major repairs or complete reconstruction. About 420,000 children – three in five – had no access to face-to-face learning.

Israeli air raids are a constant threat, with at least 300 children killed since last October’s “ceasefire”. Last week, eight-year-old Wafaa Akila and her father were killed when their car was struck on the way back home from school in western Gaza.

With the formal education system in ruins, parents and teachers have stepped in, opening temporary learning spaces in tents and volunteer initiatives.

Noha Khadra, who spent 10 years as a teacher, opened the Elyaa’ School in January, operating under the supervision of the Ministry of Education.

Pupils learn in tents with a few desks and not enough chairs, while other essentials such as blackboards are in poor condition.

More than 1,100 students have enrolled in the ‘field school, but there are only 40 volunteer teachers and administrative staff.

Despite the obstacles, she said there is high demand for places in the school, but a lack of resources and staff has meant a gruelling initial nine months for the principal.

“At the beginning, there were no tables. The children were sitting on mattresses. Many students come to us without stationery… so we buy it for them ourselves as much as we can,” she told Al Jazeera.

“I am honestly upset about the classroom conditions. This project has drained my energy, and I cannot provide more than what I am already doing.”

The school provides children with a place away from the everyday pressures of displacement and also access to essentials for survival, such as water.

The situation in private schools is better than the voluntary centres, but the high costs make them affordable only to a minority of parents in Gaza.

Zahra Saleh, 25, enrolled her six-year-old son, Ibrahim, in first grade and her five-year-old son, Karam, in kindergarten at the Abdul Aziz Private School in the west of Gaza City.

After finding most private schools too expensive, she finally found one she could afford. Zahra’s husband, like many men in Gaza, is unemployed, so paying the 400 shekels ($131) monthly school fees is difficult. But she did not want Ibrahim, who was beginning his first year of formal schooling, to lose any more education.

She also wanted her children to have a regular routine, with classes from 7am to noon. Learning subjects such as Arabic, English and Mathematics as they would have done before the war, was also her hope.

“I’m in a very difficult financial situation. I had to work at the school so I could reduce the cost of the fees for my children,” Zahra told Al Jazeera.

“I taught him at home as much as I could, but children don’t learn everything at home. In the end, we had to send him to a school. It’s just a normal school environment. That’s what I want.”

Families are also struggling with the growing costs of school supplies, with 12 notepads selling for six shekels ($1.96) before the war but now costing four shekels ($1.31) for just one.

The schooling crisis comes at a time of acute financial hardship for almost every Palestinian in Gaza.

Abdul Aziz began as a field school in tents with volunteer teachers in 2024, before moving to its current rented building in Shujaiya, west of Gaza City, for the new school year starting this month.

Around 20 staff teach 300 students, aged between three and 15, a much lower student-to-teacher ratio than in non-private schools.

Gaza’s labour market is now “largely nonfunctional”, with more than 90 percent of working-age people without a job. The World Bank estimated in May that $71.5bn was needed for Gaza’s recovery and reconstruction.

The financial pressure facing families is part of a broader economic collapse in the Strip. The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics said Gaza’s GDP contracted by 84 percent in 2025 compared with 2023, while unemployment reached 78 percent.

Doaa Qdeih, Abdul Aziz Private School’s director, is mindful of the financial difficulties families face, so has some leeway on payments with parents, including Zahra.

“I found a lot of flexibility. They welcomed me, supported me and understood my circumstances,” she said.

The school does not have one fixed fee for every student. Qdeih said she considers each family’s circumstances before deciding what it can pay.

“I don’t set a fixed amount. Before I set the amount, I look at the situation of the people — what they do for work and what the child’s circumstances are — and then we decide what they can afford,” she said.

“We have families who support each other. You find someone who can afford to pay 300 shekels ($80) contributing, while another family cannot pay anything. There is solidarity among us.”

Almost all this money from the fees goes towards rent and operating costs. Qdeih also used profits from another business she owns to furnish and repair the building the school now uses. But she does not see private schools as the solution to Gaza’s education crisis.

“I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again: if the government or the ministry provides places for education, we are ready to volunteer,” she said.

“We don’t want anything in return. We just want to continue serving the children and give them the education they deserve.”