Tareq Thabet (Ṭāriq Thābit) ( طارق عادل محمد ثابت ), age 38, from Dayr al-Balah, was the manager of the UCAS Technology Incubator at the University College of Applied Sciences in Gaza for over ten years up to the time of his death. He dedicated himself to the promotion of small businesses and the training of aspiring entrepreneurs in Gaza by providing administrative, technical, and financial support. He nurtured projects and startups that focused on agribusiness, technology transfer, youth and female job creation, and knowledge creation.

Mr. Thabet earned his BA (Computer Engineering) in 2008, and his MBA in 2016, both from the Islamic University in Gaza. In 2009, he was awarded second place in the MIT Arab Business Plan Competition in Palestine. He started work at the UCAS Incubator in 2014 and helped develop the Incubator by tripling the number of applicants, designing and developing incubation, acceleration and networking models that suited the Palestinian environment, and reinforcing startup companies. Over time, he supervised more than 150 entrepreneurial projects and startups that grew to employ hundreds of people. In 2013, he founded Mobaderoon for Entrepreneurship Magazine, the first specialized printed magazine in Palestine. He also served as a juror for the Munir Al-Kaloti Award, “For a Better Tomorrow We Innovate,” an initiative of the Palestinian Welfare Association (Taawon).

As a Hubert Humphrey Fellow, part of the U.S. Fulbright Program, Mr. Thabet was resident at Michigan State University from 2021-2022, where he built on his extensive experience in the nonprofit sector and entrepreneurship by taking courses in finance and marketing, networking extensively with his local counterparts, and speaking to local community groups and youth. He is remembered as a “motivated, kind, and loyal” person who contributed to the local community by collaborating with the Lansing Economic Area Partnership, promoting entrepreneurship in the Lansing region. His overarching goal was to take new knowledge, relationships and experience back with him to Gaza to improve the local economy. 

Mr. Thabet was killed on 29 October 2023, when his apartment in Dayr al-Balah was bombed by the Israeli military, and 16 members of his family, including his wife, his children, and his parents, died alongside him. 

Photo credits: The State News; LinkedIn