One of the original founders of the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement Hamas, Ibrahim Al-Yazouri,  passed away on Thursday, February 11, at the age of 80, after a long illness. Some media sources in Palestine reported that Al-Yazouri’s health deteriorated as a result of complications caused by the coronavirus.

Al-Yazouri, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin and others founded Hamas in December 1987. In the following year, the Israeli occupation forces arrested all of the founders of the movement, except for Sheikh Yassin. When Sheikh Yassin was assassinated by Israel on March 22, 2004, Al-Yazouri’s son, Moamen, was also martyred.

The Hamas Politburo issued a statement condoling Al-Yazouri’s family and the Palestinian people for the passing of one of its founders.

Al-Yazouri has spent his life promoting the struggle for Palestinian freedom. “He was known for his patience and steadfastness, bravery, sincerity and love for his brethren and his people,” the statement said.  

Al-Yazouri was born in the village of Beit Daras in 1941, seven years before the Nakba (Catastrophe – the ethnic cleansing of Palestine in 1948), when Israel was created in occupied Palestine. He studied the first grade of primary school in the village and then dropped out of school due to the 1948 war. 

Beit Daras was located 32 kilometers north-east of Gaza and was ethnically cleansed by Zionist militias. It was one of nearly 500 Palestinian towns and villages to be destroyed.

Al-Yazouri moved from his village to Isdud (today’s Ashdod) and stayed there with his family for several days. After the withdrawal of the Egyptian army, he went to Majdal to escape Zionist violence at the time. Eventually, the family ended up in Khan Younis refugee camp in the Gaza Strip.

Enrolled in schools run by the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), Al-Yazouri finished primary and middle school in Khan Younis, and then graduated from high school and went to Cairo University in 1960 to study at the Faculty of Pharmacy. Following his graduation in 1965, he returned to Gaza, where he opened his own pharmacy.

Palestine Today reported, citing a Hamas spokesman’s statement to the Turkey-based Anadolu News Agency, that Al-Yazouri “died in the European Hospital in the City of Khan Younis, south of the Gaza Strip after he was diagnosed with the coronavirus.”

Palestine Chronicle photojournalist, Fawzi Mahmoud, was at Al-Yazouri’s funeral, which was attended by Hamas’s top leadership in Gaza. He sent us these photos. 

(All Photos: Fawzi Mahmoud, The Palestine Chronicle)

(The Palestine Chronicle, MEMO)