- Speaker: . Shaykh Muhammad Musa as Sharif
- Category: BIOGRAPHY
- Language: ARABIC-ENGLISH
The Life of Muhammad ‘Izz ad-Deen al-Qassaam – Shaykh Muhammad Musa ash-Shareef.
‘Izz al-Din al-Qassam was a preacher from Haifa who launched a small and short-lived but significant armed revolt in northern Palestine. In contrast to sporadic bursts of violence throughout the first decade of the British Mandate, Qassam’s uprising marked the first attempt at a coherently articulated and organized revolt against the British. Although Qassam was killed in a skirmish with British forces on 19 November 1935 and his uprising swiftly put down, his death was promptly equated with martyrdom in the popular imagination. Qassam came to represent a Palestinian nationalism that transcended the ineffective leadership of Hajj Amin al-Husseini and other elites seen as stooges of the British. Huge numbers of people attended his funeral in Haifa, catalyzing a series of strikes across Palestine, which in turn sparked armed rebellion in spring 1937 (Khalidi 25).
Popular veneration for Qassam is perhaps best reflected in the poetry of Nuh Ibrahim, a student of Qassam’s who wrote poetry in the Palestinian dialect. Ibrahim’s poem, “O What A Loss, ‘Izz Eddin,” which extolled the lion-like, valorous virtues of the fallen rebel, was adopted and sung throughout Palestine (Shabeeb 66).
Qassam is representative of the “remarkable heroism” that characterized the Arab Revolt, but the outcome comprised a few weak concessions from the British that they were ultimately unable to uphold (Khalidi 26).
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