Ekrima Sabri

Sheikh Ekrima Sa‘id Sabri is one of the foremost Islamic scholars and religious leaders in Jerusalem. The former grand mufti of the city and regular preacher at al-Aqsa Mosque, Sabri is widely admired by Jerusalemites for his steadfastness in the face of ongoing Israeli repression.

Sources differ on Ekrima Sa‘id Sabri’s birth year. Some indicate he was born in November 1938, while others suggest 1939. Regardless, the man who would come to be known as the “Guardian of the Pulpit” of al-Aqsa Mosque was born in Qalqilya in a tumultuous time in Palestine’s modern history.1 By 1939, Colonial British Mandate forces had crushed the Great Palestinian Revolt, decimating the Palestinian nationalist movement and the Palestinian countryside. Amid the chaos, Sheikh Ekrima was born into a devout, educated Muslim family. His father, Sa’id Sabri, was a judge in Jerusalem and a member of the Sharia Court of Appeal.

Sheikh Ekrima, as he is known, was just shy of 10 during the 1948 War, which left a lasting impression on him. From a young age, he witnessed immense injustice. This, together with his exposure to Islam at home and in his community, inspired his quest for justice.

After completing his secondary education in nearby Nablus, he obtained a bachelor’s degree from the Faculty of Sharia at the University of Baghdad in 1963. In 1989, he earned a master’s degree in jurisprudence and legislation, in addition to a certificate in practicing legal advocacy in 1990. He subsequently obtained a PhD in general jurisprudence from al-Azhar University in Egypt in 2001.2

By 1967, when Israel occupied the West Bank, Sheikh Ekrima had already lived under Colonial British and Jordanian rule. His religious education, coupled with witnessing the dispossession of hundreds of thousands in 1948 and 1967, inspired the sheikh to devote his religious work to the defense of Palestinian rights.

Sheikh Ekrima held various academic positions and, shortly after the death of his father in 1973, the position of preacher of the al-Aqsa Mosque was vacant. He applied for the position and was accepted, but requested that the Department of Islamic Waqf in Jerusalem not give him any financial compensation for the sermons that he delivered in the mosque.

Over the years, he honed his skills as a preacher and scholar, building a reputation for knowledge of Islamic jurisprudence and eloquence in his sermons, in which he often spoke of the sanctity of al-Aqsa Mosque and the importance of its defense. But it was these sermons that got him into trouble, time and again, with Israeli authorities. He was first summoned by Israeli authorities on November 6, 1973, shortly after delivering a Friday sermon at the al-Aqsa Mosque titled “Arrogance and Its Harms,” in which he addressed the arrogance of the occupation and its capriciousness, predicting that these would eventually come back to haunt it.

Sheikh Ekrima was summoned for questioning dozens of times throughout his life, and almost always due to his sermons at al-Aqsa Mosque. These interrogations increased after he was made Grand Mufti of Jerusalem in 1994 by Yasser Arafat, chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and president of the newly created Palestinian Authority (PA). As grand mufti, Sheikh Ekrima was effectively the highest Islamic legal authority in Palestine, responsible for interpreting Islamic law, issuing religious rulings (fatwas), and overseeing the Islamic Waqf Department, which administers the Islamic holy sites in Jerusalem.

Sheikh Ekrima’s tenure as grand mufti coincided with the outbreak of the Second Intifada in 2000, and ongoing disputes over Jerusalem’s status placed him in the spotlight. Throughout this period, he frequently spoke out against Israel’s oppressive occupation of East Jerusalem and its attempts to alter the Status Quo at the al-Aqsa Mosque. During his sermons, and in many of his public speeches, he affirmed the Islamic identity of al-Aqsa Mosque and reminded Muslims of their duty to protect it. In a May 2022 interview with Al Jazeera, Sheikh Ekrima insisted that “al-Aqsa is for Muslims by God’s will,” that he does not recognize Jewish claims to the site, and that “it is named the al-Aqsa Mosque, not the Temple Mount.”3

While his sermons and statements continue to inspire thousands of faithful Palestinians, extremist Israeli groups and the Israeli government consider them as provocative and inciteful, leading to his repeated detention. In fact, his vocal political positioning irked Palestinian authorities, too. In 2006, Sheikh Ekrima was removed from his position as grand mufti by PA President Mahmoud Abbas, who took offense to the sheikh’s critiques of his approach to dealing with Israel and Hamas.4 Despite his dismissal, the sheikh retained significant influence through his continued involvement with the Waqf Department and his position as a preacher at al-Aqsa Mosque.

For many Palestinians, particularly those in Jerusalem, Sheikh Ekrima is the guardian of al-Aqsa Mosque and a voice of resistance against Israeli oppression. Despite being removed from the illustrious post of grand mufti—and arguably, because of the many Israeli summonses, bans from al-Aqsa Mosque, and military orders against him—Sheikh Ekrima has persisted in his activism, earning him great respect and praise among Palestinians. The octogenarian has not once surrendered under Israeli pressure—an embodiment, surely, of Palestinian sumud.

In August 2024, Sheikh Ekrima’s daughter, Lubaba, explained how she and the rest of her family learn to be resilient from the sheikh despite living in constant fear. Israeli forces routinely threaten to demolish their home and prohibit the aging preacher from travel, yet “ironically,” she shared, “we derive our sense of patience, integrity, and strength from him.”5 She described her father as “a highly confident person who stands by his principles. He says things like, ‘I will sit here—at my house. If they aim to demolish it, I will stay right here. Let them demolish it over my head if they choose to.’”

Since being stripped of the title of grand mufti in 2006, and despite worsening Israeli violence against Palestinians, Sheikh Ekrima has not backed down from his message of resistance, particularly during periods of heightened tension in Jerusalem and al-Aqsa Mosque. Indeed, the first military order against him was issued in 2007, when he was punished with a travel ban, and later with an order of expulsion from al-Aqsa Mosque. Other decisions banned him from entering the West Bank beyond Jerusalem’s borders and communicating with specific individuals, as well as making statements to particular media outlets.6

In July 2017, Israeli forces injured Sheikh Ekrima during a protest against Israel’s installment of metal detectors at the entrances to al-Aqsa Mosque.7 The sheikh called for mass prayers outside the compound and to boycott entering its premises until the detectors were removed—a protest so large that Israel removed the barriers.8 Daoud Kuttab interviewed the sheikh following these historic protests:

Escalating Israeli violence in Jerusalem since the 2021 Unity Intifada, and especially since October 7, 2023, has invariably targeted Sheikh Sabri. In March 2021, for example, Israeli police arrested him from his home with no explanation. Members of his family described the event and suspected it was due to the sheikh’s recent remarks about a noticeable increase in the number of extremist Jewish raids on al-Aqsa Mosque.10 Despite his old age and ill health, Israel does not spare the seasoned preacher-activist its oppressive detention tactics. In September 2023, for example, LAVI, an extremist Israeli organization, filed a motion against the sheikh for “incitement to terrorism.” LAVI claimed that he was involved in terrorist activities and communicating with a foreign agent.11

Systematic incitement campaigns against the sheikh spiked immediately after Israel declared war on Gaza on October 7, 2023. In the wake of calls by extremist Israelis for his assassination, the Supreme Islamic Committee in Jerusalem issued the following statement two days later: “We have received information about threats and incitement by settlers to assassinate and eliminate the sheikh.” The sheikh’s image was shared on an inflammatory Telegram channel created by Israeli extremists called “Nazi Hunters,” along with a post that revealed the location of his residence, marking him as a target for potential assassination at a time when Israeli public anti-Palestinian sentiment was at a fever pitch.12

But these threats did not stop the sheikh. During his Friday sermon on August 2, 2024, for example, Sheikh Ekrima made reference to the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh, head of the political bureau of Hamas, whom he referred to as a martyr: “The residents of Jerusalem and those on the pulpit of the blessed al-Aqsa Mosque consider Ismail Haniyeh to be a martyr before God, and we ask God Almighty to have mercy on him.” He then announced that “the funeral prayer in absentia for the martyr Haniyeh will be held immediately after the end of Friday prayers.”13 Israeli forces forthwith detained the sheikh from his home.

Lubaba described the traumatic incident:

The frail sheikh requires daily medications that the family were too frightened to give him before he was hauled away, for fear that the police would keep him overnight. But they also feared that he would be physically abused while in detention. “We absolutely refused to even consider the possibility of him staying overnight,” Lubaba described. “We know about the horrendous things that happen inside al-Moskobiyya [detention center] . . . Thank goodness he was released the same day.”15

Hamza Qatina, Sheikh Ekrima’s lawyer, told Jerusalem Story that after a five-hour interrogation, the Jerusalem Police Commander issued a decision banning the sheikh from al-Aqsa Mosque for six months. The police also deliberately photographed him in the investigation room with a huge Israeli flag behind him, which they then published on social media.16

This is not the first time that Sheikh Ekrima has been banned from al-Aqsa Mosque. He received his first six-month ban in 2020, in addition to other subsequent orders. The sheikh told Jerusalem Story that the Israelis punish any voice criticizing their violations in al-Aqsa Mosque: “I explained to them that my position is a principled position of faith that will not change. I told them directly, ‘al-Aqsa is for Muslims only, and there is no room for giving up any grain of soil from al-Aqsa.’”17

At 87, Sheikh Ekrima is not done. In December 2025, the religious leader warned of rising Israeli threats against al-Aqsa Mosque: “Jerusalem is undergoing a painful stage as a result of Israel’s extremist practices” and a lack of deterrence, he said to the media. He added:

On March 6, 2026, Israeli forces detained and questioned him at al-Moskobiyya, an East Jerusalem police station and jail, for two hours, after which he was banned from entering the Old City for 15 days. He was also forced to sign a pledge that he would appear for questioning if summoned again. This arrest followed the sheikh’s criticism of Israel’s closure of al-Aqsa Mosque since the war on Iran began on February 28 (see The Third Friday of Ramadan Comes a Week into War, with al-Aqsa Mosque Closed and Jerusalem at a Standstill). The learned preacher stated that it is “religiously impermissible to suspend Friday prayers or close the Islamic holy site.”19 He also warned of Israeli schemes to target and partition al-Aqsa Mosque, calling on Muslims to protect the sacred shrine.

Beyond his religious guidance and political activism, Sheikh Ekrima has helped establish Islamic institutions in Jerusalem and elsewhere, and to expand Islamic scholarship through writings and lectures. In 1992, he founded the Association of Scholars and Preachers in Palestine, and he is the head of the Islamic Supreme Fatwa Council in Palestine. He is also a founding member of the World Islamic Mosques Conference Association in Mecca and has been the head of the Higher Muslim Committee in Jerusalem since 1997.20

Among his many publications, including his doctoral dissertation titled “Islamic Endowment between Theory and Practice” and the booklet “Palestine: The Human Factor and the Land,” which he wrote during the Second Intifada, Sheikh Ekrima is most celebrated for his memoir, Stations from My Life and Journeys, published in Arabic in 2021. In it, the sheikh documents in detail the long history of Israeli retaliation against him, as well as his determination to persevere.

While he may not be as widely published as other Muslim scholars, Sheikh Ekrima’s legacy undeniably extends beyond the written page: a preacher and activist who has stood unwaveringly and fearlessly by Jerusalem’s Palestinians and al-Aqsa Mosque, the third holiest site to billions of Muslims worldwide, through many long decades of Israeli military occupation and oppression.

Assali, Khalil, and Daoud Kuttab. “Israel Detains Muslim Spiritual Leader Sheikh Ekrima Sabri and Bans Him from Entering al-Aqsa Mosque for Six Months.” Jerusalem Story, August 9, 2024.

“Ikrima Sabri: ‘Al-Aqsa Is for Muslims by God’s Will.’” Al Jazeera, May 7, 2022.

“Israel Arrests Former Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Ikrima Sabri.” Al Jazeera, March 10, 2021.

“Israeli Police Ban Sheikh Sabri from Entering Old City of J’lem.” Palestinian Information Center, March 7, 2026.

“Israel Removes Metal Detectors from al-Aqsa Compound.” Al Jazeera, July 25, 2017.

“Israel Summons al-Aqsa Preacher Sheikh Ekrima Sabri.” New Arab, October 10, 2021.

“Jerusalem Diary: June–September 2006.” Jerusalem Quarterly, no. 27 (2006).

Jundi, Aseel. “Sheikh Ekrima Sabri, ‘Guardian of the Pulpit’ of al-Aqsa Mosque, Targeted by Extremist Israeli Groups.” Jerusalem Story, January 22, 2024.

Kuttab, Daoud. “Ekrima Sabri: The Inclusive Sheikh Who Was Injured in the Protests.” Arab News, August 20, 2017.

“Sheikh Sabri: Jerusalem and Aqsa Entered a Critical Stage amid Lack of Deterrence.” Palestinian Information Center, December 23, 2025.

[Profile photo: AA]