By Kaamil Ahmed
JERUSALEM (AA) – A prominent Palestinian leader set to be released from prison on Tuesday has been hit with a fresh travel ban by the Israeli authorities.
Israel’s Interior Ministry has banned Sheikh Raed Salah, the leader of the northern branch of the Islamic Movement (which represents Palestinians inside Israel), from leaving the country for another six-month period, Omar Khamayseh, Salah’s lawyer, told Anadolu Agency on Monday.
Salah has been banned from traveling abroad since 2015, but the ban appears to have been renewed in light of his imminent release.
Salah was imprisoned in May of last year after an Israeli court found him guilty of “inciting violence” against Israelis.
In 2015, Israel banned the Islamic Movement’s northern branch — likewise accusing it of “incitement to violence” — amid heightened tension over Jerusalem’s flashpoint Al-Aqsa Mosque complex.
The movement has come under scrutiny in recent years due to its outspoken opposition to increasingly frequent visits by hardline Jewish activists to the Al-Aqsa complex, which is revered by both Muslims and Jews.
Tensions boiled over in late 2015 when a ban on young Muslims entering the mosque complex — and an exponential increase in the number of Jewish visitors to the site — led to a series of violent clashes.
Salah was born in 1958 in the city of Umm al-Fahm in northern Israel. He later studied Islamic Law at Hebron University in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
He served as mayor of Umm al-Fahm for three consecutive terms from 1987 to 2001 and has led the Islamic Movement’s northern branch since 1996.
