Personal Info
- Country of residence: Palestine
Information
Hilal Shukri Nour El-Din Tuffaha was born on November 21, 1954, in Nablus. He is married and has a daughter. He attended Al-Khaldounia Elementary School and Sharif Sabouh Preparatory School in Nablus. He obtained his matriculation certificate (ninth grade) while imprisoned in 1976, and his high school diploma while also incarcerated. He worked in the office of the Governor of Nablus after the establishment of the Palestinian Authority in the 1990s, then was transferred to the Palestinian General Intelligence Service in 2004, where he worked until his retirement in 2008. Tuffaha owns a shop selling and repairing watches and eyeglasses.
The Israeli occupation forces first arrested Tuffaha in 1970, and he spent six months in Nablus Central Prison. He traveled to Syria in 1973 to join the resistance, but the outbreak of war two weeks after his arrival forced him to return to Palestine, where he was arrested by the occupation forces at the border and sentenced to two years in prison. He was arrested again in 1975, spent eighteen days under interrogation, and was then released. He was arrested once more in 1976 and sentenced by the occupation to eight years in prison. His lawyer managed to secure an offer of deportation from Palestine in exchange for his release after about two months of detention, but he refused the offer, preferring to remain in prison rather than agree to deportation. He was released in 1985.
Tuffaha became involved in the activities of the First Intifada and played a role in founding some of the resistance groups in Nablus at the time, such as the "Popular Army" and the "Abu Jihad Brigades." Tuffaha was arrested again in 1990 and sentenced to six months of administrative detention.
After his retirement, Tuffaha devoted himself to voluntary community work, where he and others established a committee to support and assist government hospitals in 2010. The committee provided basic supplies to government hospitals, including beds, medical equipment, and medicines, and continued to operate until 2012. Tuffaha became the head of the administrative body of the Red Crescent Society in Nablus in 2015.
Tuffaha believes that the conflict in Palestine will persist as long as the Israeli occupation continues, and that hope lies with future generations. He believes the Palestinian cause has endured difficult periods, such as the Oslo Accords, which proved to be a failure, and the internal division that hindered unity. He argues that political partnership must be achieved by including all factions within the Palestine Liberation Organization and defining the various tools and forms of struggle in a way that suits the current stage.
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