She holds a Doctor of Philosophy in Politics from the University of Oxford and Master of Science in Politics from Cairo University. She wrote her doctoral thesis on the impact of state-society relations on the regional role of regional power focusing on the cases of Egypt and South Africa. Her post-doctoral research focuses on hydropolitical relations in the Nile basin. She was a visiting research fellow at the South African Institute of International Affairs in Johannesburg, Africa Institute of South Africa in Pretoria, and the German Development Institute in Bonn.