Students in a lecture hall during a class at Al-Azhar University in Gaza, December 20, 2025. EYAD AZAM / MIDDLE EAST IMAGES VIA AFP
Beaming, with a thumbs-up and a coffee cup in hand, Dana Al-Sourani celebrated returning to in-person classes. "Back to life," wrote the first-year engineering student at Al-Azhar University in Gaza, captioning a video posted on December 31, 2025, on her Instagram account. The video shows professors taking turns at the whiteboard, microphone in hand, facing attentive students.
When the dental department reopened, Dana filmed clusters of students in white coats working around "patients," mouths open, serving as guinea pigs for young trainees. "After the war, that is considered a huge achievement. No one believed there were any dental chairs left," said Ines Al-Attar, a first-year dental student at Al-Azhar University. All interviews were conducted by phone, as Israel still prohibits foreign journalists from entering the Gaza Strip.
Despite the pop music and energetic editing of these videos, it's hard to miss the gaping hole in the first building shown in a wide shot, or the blown-out windows of the university buildings Dana passes while filming herself. Even more striking is the giant blue plastic tarp behind the whiteboard where professors write formulas, serving as a wall.
