Zakaria Zubeidi

rdf:langString Zakaria Zubeidi

rdf:langString Zakaria Muhammad 'Abdelrahman Zubeidi (Arabic: زكريا محمد عبد الرحمن الزبيدي; other spellings include Zakariyah Zbeidi, Zacharia and Zubaidi) (born 1976) is the former Jenin chief of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades. He is considered a "symbol of the Intifada", and was on Israel's most-wanted list for several years. In an interview in 2005 he assumed responsibility for the 2002 Beit She'an attack that killed 6 people. He pledged to put away his weapons as part of an Israeli amnesty in 2007, though he never gave his guns up in the sense of relinquishing them to the authorities. Zubeidi nevertheless agreed to give up violence, and after a three-month probation period, was removed from Israel's wanted list. He subsequently devoted himself to 'cultural resistance' in the form of support for the Freedom Theatre at the Jenin Refugee Camp. On 28 December 2011, Israel rescinded Zubeidi's pardon, and in May 2012 he was detained without charge by the Palestinian National Authority for six months. On 27 February 2019, Zubeidi was arrested again and in May charged before an Israeli military court with carrying out at least two shooting attacks on civilian buses in the West Bank. On September 6, 2021, he escaped from the Gilboa Prison in Israel's North, together with five other Palestinian prisoners, through a tunnel that they had dug. Five days later, on September 11, 2021, Zubeidi was caught near the Israeli village of Kfar Tavor.