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Abdullah Nimar Darwish
Sheikh Abdullah Nimar Darwish (Arabic: عبد الله نمر درويش, Hebrew: עבדאללה נימר דרוויש עיסא; 1948 – 14 May 2017) was the founder of the Islamic Movement in Israel.
Darwish was born in Kafr Qasim in 1948. After completing his religious studies in Nablus, he returned to Kafr Qasim and began advocating a return to Islam and Islamic tradition, and subsequently established the Islamic Movement in Israel in 1971.
In 1979, Darwish established an underground organization called Usrat al-Jihad ("The Family of Jihad"), whose goal was to establish "an Arab Islamic state in Palestine". Usrat al-Jihad attempted to burn down an Israeli textile factory, set fire to forests, and was involved in the death of a suspected Israeli collaborator. Two years later, he was arrested together with several accomplices, and convicted of membership in a terrorist organization. He remained in prison until 1985, when he was freed as part of the Jibril Agreement between the government of Israel and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine – General Command.
Following his 1985 release, Darwish became publicly active and began to express opposition to Israeli Arabs taking part in violent behavior. In 1992, he explicitly condemned the killing of three Israeli soldiers by an Israeli Arab group. Following the Oslo Accords, the Islamic Movement in Israel Darwish had founded, split between the "Northern Branch" (in northern Israel), led by Darwish's protégé Sheikh Raed Salah—that opposed the agreement—and one led by Darwish himself, referred to as the "Southern Branch" (in southern Israel) that supported it and wanted to participate in the Israeli political process.
In later life, he continued as the spiritual leader of the Southern Branch of the Islamic Movement in Israel. In partnership with Rabbi Michael Melchior, he played an important role in setting up a major interfaith meeting in Alexandria, Egypt in 2002, during the Second Intifada; this group produced a joint declaration rejecting murder in the name of God and pledging a joint quest for peace.
Following the death of his brother in 2005, Darwish made a religious ruling allowing Muslims to donate organs for medical purposes.
Darwish founded the "Adam Centers for Dialogue Between Religions and Civilizations", and—with Rabbi Melchior—founded the Religious Peace Initiative, both of which arranges for interfaith dialogue between Muslims, Jews, and Christians. This network worked behind the scenes to ease inter-communal tensions in Acre in 2008, and to prevent inter-communal violence in 2014, when Eid al-Adha and Yom Kippur occurred on the same day.
He expressed a commitment to the rule of law, and to integration into the State of Israel and its institutions. In a 2001 Israeli newspaper interview, he said:
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Abdullah Nimar Darwish
Sheikh Abdullah Nimar Darwish (Arabic: عبد الله نمر درويش, Hebrew: עבדאללה נימר דרוויש עיסא; 1948 – 14 May 2017) was the founder of the Islamic Movement in Israel.
Darwish was born in Kafr Qasim in 1948. After completing his religious studies in Nablus, he returned to Kafr Qasim and began advocating a return to Islam and Islamic tradition, and subsequently established the Islamic Movement in Israel in 1971.
In 1979, Darwish established an underground organization called Usrat al-Jihad ("The Family of Jihad"), whose goal was to establish "an Arab Islamic state in Palestine". Usrat al-Jihad attempted to burn down an Israeli textile factory, set fire to forests, and was involved in the death of a suspected Israeli collaborator. Two years later, he was arrested together with several accomplices, and convicted of membership in a terrorist organization. He remained in prison until 1985, when he was freed as part of the Jibril Agreement between the government of Israel and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine – General Command.
Following his 1985 release, Darwish became publicly active and began to express opposition to Israeli Arabs taking part in violent behavior. In 1992, he explicitly condemned the killing of three Israeli soldiers by an Israeli Arab group. Following the Oslo Accords, the Islamic Movement in Israel Darwish had founded, split between the "Northern Branch" (in northern Israel), led by Darwish's protégé Sheikh Raed Salah—that opposed the agreement—and one led by Darwish himself, referred to as the "Southern Branch" (in southern Israel) that supported it and wanted to participate in the Israeli political process.
In later life, he continued as the spiritual leader of the Southern Branch of the Islamic Movement in Israel. In partnership with Rabbi Michael Melchior, he played an important role in setting up a major interfaith meeting in Alexandria, Egypt in 2002, during the Second Intifada; this group produced a joint declaration rejecting murder in the name of God and pledging a joint quest for peace.
Following the death of his brother in 2005, Darwish made a religious ruling allowing Muslims to donate organs for medical purposes.
Darwish founded the "Adam Centers for Dialogue Between Religions and Civilizations", and—with Rabbi Melchior—founded the Religious Peace Initiative, both of which arranges for interfaith dialogue between Muslims, Jews, and Christians. This network worked behind the scenes to ease inter-communal tensions in Acre in 2008, and to prevent inter-communal violence in 2014, when Eid al-Adha and Yom Kippur occurred on the same day.
He expressed a commitment to the rule of law, and to integration into the State of Israel and its institutions. In a 2001 Israeli newspaper interview, he said: