After losing her father in an Israeli airstrike, enduring repeated displacement and studying through power cuts and bombardment, an 18-year-old student from Gaza has topped the Palestinian national secondary school examinations, achieving the highest score in the science stream despite nearly two years of war.

Just days before her final secondary school examinations, the house opposite the temporary home where 18-year-old Saba Rabah was staying in central Gaza was bombed.

She and her family fled, leaving behind everything they owned.

It was the latest ordeal in a war that had already claimed her father's life, destroyed the family home and forced them to flee repeatedly.

Despite those hardships, Rabah emerged as the top-ranked student in the science stream of the Palestinian national secondary school examinations, known as Tawjihi, the first exams to be held in Gaza since the war erupted in October 2023.

"I achieved a score of 99.9%, ranking first in Palestine in the science stream," Rabah told AFP, dressed in her graduation gown as relatives and neighbors gathered to celebrate at Al-Maghazi refugee camp in central Gaza.

The Tawjihi examinations were held in June simultaneously in Gaza, the Israeli-occupied West Bank, Egypt and several other countries with Palestinian communities for the first time in three years.

Since the war began in October 2023, most of Gaza's schools and educational facilities have been damaged or destroyed by Israeli airstrikes and shelling, leaving tens of thousands of children without access to formal education.

Many of the surviving school buildings have been converted into overcrowded shelters for displaced families.

Around 89,000 students sat the secondary school examinations this year, including more than 25,000 in the science stream, where Rabah earned the highest score.

She dedicated her achievement to her late father, Fayed Rabah, as well as to her mother, siblings and teachers.

As soon as the results were announced, her family celebrated.

Young men danced to the beat of drums as neighbors clapped and cheered.

Rabah embraced relatives, posed for photographs and accepted bouquets of flowers beneath a portrait of her father hanging on the wall, a reminder of the loss behind the celebration.

Her achievement came after nearly two years of war.

"My father was a teacher at UNRWA schools," Rabah said, referring to the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees.

She said he was killed in an Israeli airstrike in June 2024.

Even before his death, the family had already been displaced twice after Israeli forces entered Al-Maghazi camp, while their home was destroyed in January 2024.