The Palestinian Legislative Council - The Washington Institute for ...

Mohammad Mahmoud Abu Tir*
Mohamed Mahmud Abu Tair, Muhammad Abou Tayr
Member of Parliament – National List
#2 on Change and Reform
Biographical Information
• Born 1951
• From Umm Tuba, Southeast of Jerusalem
• Resides in Umm Tuba
Personal History
• Completed primary and preparatory education in Sour Bahr School
• 1971 Completed High School Studies in al-Aqsa Legislative School
• Completed military training in Beirut as a member of Fatah
• Jailed for the first time in 1974 for eleven years. Released in Jibril deal of 1985, when
1150 Palestinians were freed in exchange for three Israeli soldiers held by the PFLP
• 1987 Joined Hamas upon its creation
• Was an Imam in Mosques in Umm Tuba and in Israeli prisons
• 1998 Imprisoned in Israeli jail for arms possession and support to Hamas cells in the
West Bank; freed in mid-2005
• In late May 2006, was threatened with loss of residence permit in Jerusalem if he did not
leave Hamas. Residency was stripped from him one month later, after the Shalit
abduction.
• Arrested by Israel following Shalit abduction
Notable Quotations
“Hamas has no problem with the Prisoners’ document's demand for a Palestinian state in all the
territories occupied in 1967 but does not accept its recognition of international decisions that
indirectly mean recognition of Israel."
--Haaretz, June 8, 2006
The following is from The Jerusalem Post:
• "I'm from this house. I have been living here not for 20 years not for 50 years not for 100
years. Um Tuba existed well before this. We have been here from the time of the Muslim
arrival in the seventh century… Would you accept anyone taking you from your house
and throwing you out of your house?"
• “There is a passage in the Koran about the tribe of Israel which says 'If I instruct you to
kill them or to force them to leave their homes no one will do so except for a very few…
Do you know what the meaning of this is? It means that throwing someone from their
home is equivalent to killing them and only very few would do such a thing to someone
else."
• “It's like putting a cat in a corner. What will he do? Everything he can to get out... I'll go to
an Israeli court because we are under occupation. We have no choice but to go to an
Israeli court. The injustice being done to me because of this issue forces me to go to an
Israeli court."
• "The prison administrators were fearful of him. If he told the prisoners to do something
they would.” – a fellow prisoner on Abu Tir during his time in jail
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