Susan Aboeid

Susan Aboeid is a Sudanese American human rights researcher and advocate. She earned her B.A. in Modern Middle Eastern Studies from Yale University in 2019, where her thesis, “People of Nowhere,” analyzed ‘refugeeness’ and refugee regimes through the testimonies of displaced people at the Kara Tepe Refugee Camp on Lesvos, Greece. Her research built on her previous work in ‘education in emergencies’ in the Moria and Kara Tepe Refugee Camps in 2018.

Following graduation, Susan moved to Nablus, Palestine where she taught World History and English Language Arts. She then consulted for the Human Rights, Conflict Resolution, and Tolerance Program in Amman, Jordan, with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). In 2022, Susan studied the application of international human rights and humanitarian law in the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt) at the Al-Haq Center for Applied International Law.

Before entering law school, Susan worked as the associate for the Arms Division at Human Rights Watch, where she focused on the protection of civilians from various indiscriminate weapons, such as cluster munitions, landmines, incendiary weapons, and lethal autonomous weapons. She has advocated for the adoption and implementation of disarmament treaties at various multilateral international fora including the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) and the Convention on Conventional Weapons (CCW). As an ‘Emerging Weapons Expert’ with the Forum on the Arms Trade, she explored the implications of arms transfers and weapons use around the world.

Susan is also the co-curator of an exhibition titled “A Prison, a Prisoner, and a Prison Guard,” which explores the themes of carcerality in the MENA region through contemporary Middle Eastern ‘prison art.’ The exhibit continues to be shown in museums and universities across the U.S. and abroad. She has contributed writings to Al-Jazeera, the Middle East and North Africa Prison Forum, the Institute for Palestine Studies, Inkstick, and Human Rights Watch.

At Georgetown Law, Susan is eager to deepen her understanding of disarmament and international humanitarian law, and to explore the intersection of privacy law, surveillance studies, and autonomous weapons systems, particularly their impact on communities of color and in the ‘Third World.’