Israeli authorities released Tayseer Abu Sneineh, the mayor of the Palestinian Authority side of Hebron after nearly eight months in administrative detention. He was taken in for incitement and suspicion of supporting terrorism in September 2025.
Abu Sneineh was elected mayor in 2017 after as steady rise in the political ranks. He used his past notoriety as a terrorist in his election campaign for having taken part in the 1980 ambush that killed six Israeli.
The attack in front of Beit Hadassah on Friday night took the lives of Howie Glatt, Gershon Klein, Ya’akov Zimmerman, Hanan Krauthammer, Eli HaZe’ev, and Shmuel Mermelstein and wounded over a dozen others. Abu Sneineh and the other terrorists involved were arrested and convicted for the murders, but later released in the controversial Jibril deal in 1985 to free Israeli hostages.
Over the years, Abu Sneineh rose in the ranks of Fatah. He was reelected in 2022 as part of an independent bloc and an alliance with Hamas and the Popular Front. Since his arrest the deputy mayor, Dr. Asma Sharabati has been filling in the position. In 2023, Dr. Sharabati and her husband were targeted in a series of attacks by rival Arab political factions. Coming from a well-connected Hebron Arba family, she earned a degree in pharmacy and went on to study sociology at Birzeit University, where her dissertation focused on “Palestinian prisoners and resistance fighters.” She worked as a part-time university lecturer at Hebron University, Palestine Polytechnic University, and Al-Quds Open University, all located in Hebron.
References:
