بسم الله الرØمن الرØيم
ABOUT ME
Dr Mona Jebril
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Dr Mona Jebril is a Palestinian‑British interdisciplinary social scientist whose research focuses on Gaza and other conflict‑affected regions in the Middle East. She is a Research Associate at the Centre for Business Research and a Bye‑Fellow in Education and Academic Development at Queens’ College, University of Cambridge.
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Her work spans major international research programmes, including UK Research and Innovation’s Global Challenges Research Fund initiative Research for Health in Conflict (R4HC‑MENA), which supports sustainable health‑research capacity across Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, and Turkey. Within this programme, Jebril led research on the political economy of health in the Gaza Strip; her work was cited by the UK government and received the 2022 Gavin Reid Prize at the Centre for Business Research.
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Earlier in her career, Jebril served as a Research Assistant at the Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge, on a project funded by the British Council and the Open Society Institute (OSI). As part of a collaboration between the Faculty of Education and CARA (the Council for At‑Risk Academics), she supported displaced Syrian academics in Turkey. Her contributions included reviewing Arabic and English literature on Syrian higher education before and after 2011, assisting in capacity‑building workshops, conducting bilingual translations, participating in research design and team discussions, and contributing analysis to the project’s final report.
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She also contributed to Close the Gap: Fair Admissions in Postgraduate Research, a flagship initiative improving equitable admissions practices for postgraduate applicants across the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge.
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Jebril’s research has been featured in academic, policy, and media platforms and translated into Arabic, Somali, Spanish, and Turkish. She is widely recognised for pioneering creative and multimodal approaches to research dissemination—working through film, animation, theatre, poetry, symbolic photography, and comic strips.
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Having lived in Gaza for twenty‑two years, Jebril’s scholarship is deeply informed by her lived experience. She began her career as a teacher in basic, preparatory, and secondary public schools before being awarded a prestigious Saïd Foundation Scholarship to pursue an MSc in Higher Education at the University of Oxford. After graduating with distinction, she returned to the Gaza Strip, where she became a lecturer at two of Gaza’s universities while simultaneously serving as Manager of the Learning Centre at the University of Palestine. During this period, she also co‑founded two academic centres and co‑founded and coordinated a scholarship programme that expanded higher‑education access for female students in Gaza.
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Jebril was later awarded a Gates Cambridge Scholarship—becoming the first ever scholar from the Gaza Strip (and, thirteen years later, still the only one). This enabled her to pursue a PhD in Education at the University of Cambridge. In 2025, she received the Gates Cambridge 25th Anniversary Impact Prize, recognising the significant societal contribution and global impact of her work.
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She is also the host of A Life Lived in Conflict podcast, an interdisciplinary podcast focused on conflict-zones in the world.
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Most recently, Jebril was awarded a British Academy Global Innovation Fellowship. Through this fellowship, she will be based at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, DC, while maintaining her formal affiliation with the Centre for Business Research as a Senior Research Fellow. During this period, she will work with Carnegie’s Middle East and North Africa Programme, contributing specifically to the organisation’s Palestine/Israel research strand.
ACADEMIC QUALIFICATIONS
B.A English Language and Literature, Al -Azhar University (Gaza- Palestine) | First and on Honour List
Photo credit: Manar al Zraiy, CC BY-SA 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
MSc in Higher Education, Faculty of Education,University of Oxford
PhD, Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge (Passed with “No Correction”)
Research Interests
(Open to New Topics and New Connections!)
Social and Epistemic Justice ​
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Gaza and the Occupied Palestinian Territories
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Conflict‑affected areas
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Arab world / Middle East region
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Reform and development
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Social and epistemic justice
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Education and higher education
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Widening participation
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Political economy
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Health
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Migration
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Policy
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Sociology of inequality (health, education, etc.)
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Dialogue and creative modalities
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Oppression and symbolic violence
Awards, Prizes and Recognitions
(Open to New Connections!)
Awards
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2025-2026 British Academy–Carnegie Global Innovation Fellowship: One of only two awardees of this highly prestigious
fellowship, securing approximately £150,000 in competitive research funding.
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2025 Winner of Gates Cambridge Impact Prize 2025: I have been selected as a winner of Gates 25th anniversary Impact Prize, which celebrates the far-reaching impact of their scholars.
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Nominations were open to all members of Gates Community which included more than 1, 795 alumni, 279 scholars in residence, all from 112 countries. For more details, see: https://www.gatescambridge.org/about/news/gates-cambridge-impact-prize-launched/ |For my Impact Prize Winner Profile, read here.
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Entries were judged by an esteemed panel consisting of Professor Sir Leszek Borysiewicz, the 345th Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge, former Chair of Cancer Research UK and the former Chief Executive of the Medical Research Council; Joe Cerrell, The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Managing Director for Europe, the Middle East and East Asia; Professor Tebello Nyokong, Distinguished Professor of Chemistry at Rhodes University and the 2009 L’Oréal-UNESCO Award for Women in Science recipient; and Dr Gillian Tett, the 45th Provost of King’s College London, Moral Money Co-Founder and Member of the Editorial Board & Columnist at the Financial Times.
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2022 Gavin Reid Prize for CBR Early Career Researchers- University of Cambridge
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Awarded the 2022 Gavin Reid Prize for the best paper by CBR (Cambridge Centre for Business Research)
early career researcher, for my report: The Political Economy of Health in the Gaza Strip (Occupied Palestinian
Territories).
2012 Winner of four scholarships in the same year to study for a PhD in the UK:
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-Gates Cambridge Scholarship – a global and exceptionally competitive scholarship to study for a PhD in Education at the University of Cambridge (as their first ever scholar from Gaza and Second from Palestine). The scholarship was “exceptionally renewed for a fifth year” for me to complete my study on higher education in Gaza.
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-Offered doctoral scholarships by Cambridge Trust, Durham University, and Bristol University.
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2005 Said Foundation Scholarship to study for an MSc at the University of Oxford
1994-98 Academic Excellence Tuition Fee Exemption [for 3 ½ years of 4] by Al Azhar University of Gaza during my B.A study there.
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Recognitions
2023 Featured by University of Cambridge in their List for International Women Day #2023
Featured by the University of Cambridge in their list of women changing the world at the university:
(see: https://www.cam.ac.uk/stories/celebrating-cambridge-women-part-two )
2022-present Bye-fellowship at Queens’ College Cambridge (3 years)
2022 Honorary Research Associateship at the University of Cambridge Centre for Business Research.
Invited for this honorary position after the end of my contract with CBR, so as continue to be part of the
Centre’s community.
2021 Global Talent Visa by UK.
Visa is given for leaders or potential leaders in academia and research, based on endorsement by the British
Academy as an exceptional promise.
2019 Vice-Chancellor’s Research Impact and Public Engagement Award, University of Cambridge.
Listed (short/long listed) for the award and featured in the award booklet.
2019-2021 Supernumerary Fellowship at Queens’ College Cambridge. Nominated for non- stipendiary fellowship for two years. The fellowship was also exceptionally renewed for a third year.
2018-present Invitation to join CSaP Network for Evidence and Expertise, University of Cambridge.
Acting as an expert, advising policy fellows from the MENA region on their strategic questions.