A leader in the Fatah movement, born in 1956, and he is one of 23 remaining pre-prisoners. Oslo agreementHe miraculously escaped death after Israeli aircraft opened fire on a car in which he was traveling with 4 of his companions, all of whom were martyred, and he remained to be called the “living martyr.”
Birth and upbringing
Muhammad Al-Tus was born in 1956 in the town of Al-Jab’a, south of Bethlehem in the West Bank. It is a village whose history dates back 1,800 years. Its name indicates an Aramaic origin meaning hill, and it is called Jabata in Romanian.
This town rises 668 meters above sea level, and is located on the front line that was determined in 1948 when Zionist groups seized 1,700 dunums (a dunum equals a thousand square metres) of its lands.
The town of Al-Jabaa continues to be subjected to more Israeli harassment, and its lands are being devoured Settlement expansionsUntil it became closed, with no entrance except from a direction under siege by the occupation forces.
Muhammad received his first education in his besieged area, and obtained a high school diploma from Halhul School, and during that time he was forced to immigrate with his family to Jordan after… Setback 1967But they returned after two months.
Struggle and arrest
Mohammed Al-Tous joinedFatah movement In 1970, he participated in its national activities and resistance activities, and carried out several operations with his group between 1983 and 1985, including one on September 17, 1984, a second on the Green Road “Gush Etzion” on November 24, 1984, and a third in the Bethlehem area. On January 31, 1985, and operations against occupation factories in the Beit Shemesh settlement.
Muhammad was arrested early and entered the occupation prisons while he was still a 14-year-old child on October 17, 1970, that is, the year he joined the Fatah movement. Then the occupation arrested him again in 1975, and this time he escaped from prison on June 27. June 1975, he became persecuted and later arrested by Israel 4 times in the years 1981, 1982, 1983, and 1985.
Mountain cell
On October 6, 1985, the occupation forces ambushed a group that was on its way to the border with Jordan, including Muhammad al-Tus. After a long chase, Israeli aircraft fired bullets at the group’s car. They all fell martyrs, except al-Tus, who was hit by several bullets and was arrested bleeding. He was severely beaten despite his serious injury.
Al-Tus was subjected to interrogation for 10 days while he was in this condition, then he was transferred to another center to be subjected to severe torture that lasted more than 3 months, after which the occupation forces demolished his house while concealing the news of his arrest, so that Muhammad’s family held a funeral for him and did not know that he was alive until 6 months later. From the incident, which is why he was called the “living martyr.”
Muhammad al-Tus was charged with belonging to the Fatah movement and resisting the occupation as part of an “active and distinguished military guerrilla group in resistance work,” but he refused to stand before the court or acknowledge it, so a military court issued several life imprisonment sentences against him.
While in prison, Al-Tus rejected the policies of the Prison Service, and participated in activities and hunger strikes to express this, until he became one of the leaders of the prisoner movement.
The teacher, Amna Al-Tous, the wife of the prisoner Muhammad, continued to live in the hope of his release, and went out every time to support the prisoners, hugging his picture, along with his children, Shadi, Fidaa, and Thaer.
In 2014, the occupation authorities announced their agreement to release Muhammad Al-Tus in a prisoner exchange deal, but they backed down, causing great pain to Amna. After she entered a coma for a year, she died on the first of January 2015.
The occupation forces also continued to harass the family of Muhammad al-Tus with various types of harassment, including demolishing his house 3 times, and attacking the funeral of his sister Nayfa al-Tus on July 1, 2022.
What is worse is that he was placed on every list of those released in prisoner exchange deals and then reneged on the promise, until he became among the deans of Palestinian prisoners due to the long years he spent in the occupation prisons, and he remained on the list of 23 pre-Oslo prisoners.
Compositions
Behind the walls, Al-Tus wrote two books, one of which tells his biography, the story of his involvement in resistance work, and his views on developments in the Palestinian cause and the Arab region. It was published under the title “Eye of the Mountain” in 2021, and the other recounts his diaries inside prison, and was published under the title “Sweetness and Bitterness” in 2023.
