Gaza student Saba Rabah tops Palestinian science exams after displacement and father's death

Palestinian student Saba Rabah, 18, scored 99.9 percent and ranked first in the science stream of the Tawjihi national secondary school exams after repeated displacement in Gaza and the death of her father during the war.

Rabah celebrated with relatives and neighbours in Al-Maghazi refugee camp in central Gaza. The exams were held in June in Gaza, the Israeli-occupied West Bank, Egypt and several other countries with Palestinian communities, in the first such exams held in Gaza since the war began in October 2023.

Around 89,000 students sat the exams this year, including more than 25,000 in the science stream.

Rabah said her father, Fayed Rabah, a teacher at UNRWA schools, was killed in an Israeli airstrike in June 2024. She said her family had already been displaced twice after Israeli forces entered Al-Maghazi camp, and that their home was demolished in January 2024.

She said the family was displaced many more times, that she lost half of her books, and that power cuts and internet outages made studying harder. At times, she travelled to another area for private lessons and exams.

Rabah said she hopes to receive a full scholarship to study medicine. Her mother, Feryal Ahmed Rabah, said her daughter often studied by the light of a mobile phone torch and that the result brought joy after grief and displacement.