Nasser al-Din al-Shaer ( ar, ناصر الدين الشاعر) (born 1961) is the former

Education Minister of the Palestinian National Authority The Ministry of Education and Higher Education of the Palestinian National Authority is the branch of the Palestinian government in charge of managing the education in the Palestinian territories. It was established in 1994 after the formation of th ...

serving as a member of

Hamas Hamas (, ; , ; an acronym of , "Islamic Resistance Movement") is a Palestinian Sunni-Islamic fundamentalist, militant, and nationalist organization. It has a social service wing, Dawah, and a military wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Bri ...

. He also served as Deputy Prime Minister in the previous cabinet. After the

Hamas takeover of the Gaza Strip The Battle of Gaza, also referred to as Hamas's takeover of Gaza, was a military conflict between Fatah and Hamas, that took place in the Gaza Strip between June 10 and 15, 2007. It was a prominent event in the Fatah–Hamas conflict, centered o ...

, all Hamas ministers in the PNA government were dismissed, including al-Shaer.

Academic background & career

Shaer holds a

doctorate A doctorate (from Latin ''docere'', "to teach"), doctor's degree (from Latin ''doctor'', "teacher"), or doctoral degree is an academic degree awarded by universities and some other educational institutions, derived from the ancient formalism ''l ...

comparative religion Comparative religion is the branch of the study of religions with the systematic comparison of the doctrines and practices, themes and impacts (including migration) of the world's religions. In general the comparative study of religion yie ...

from

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

University of Manchester , mottoeng = Knowledge, Wisdom, Humanity , established = 2004 – University of Manchester Predecessor institutions: 1956 – UMIST (as university college; university 1994) 1904 – Victoria University of Manchester 1880 – Victoria Univer ...

, where his dissertation was a comparative study on role of women in Islam and Judaism. He later worked as a research scholar on Religion & Democracy at

New York University New York University (NYU) is a private research university in New York City. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded by a group of New Yorkers led by then-Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin. In 1832, the ...

, focusing on US history (1998). In 2001 he was appointed Dean of Islamic Law (

Shari'a Sharia (; ar, شريعة, sharīʿa ) is a body of religious law that forms a part of the Islamic tradition. It is derived from the religious precepts of Islam and is based on the sacred scriptures of Islam, particularly the Quran and the H ...

) at

An-Najah National University An-Najah National University ( ar, جامعة النجاح الوطنية) is a Palestinian non-governmental public university governed by a board of trustees. It is located in Nablus, in the northern West Bank. The university has 22,000 studen ...

Nablus Nablus ( ; ar, نابلس, Nābulus ; he, שכם, Šəḵem, ISO 259-3: ; Samaritan Hebrew: , romanized: ; el, Νεάπολις, Νeápolis) is a Palestinian city in the West Bank, located approximately north of Jerusalem, with a populati ...

. He has published several books and papers on gender, globalization, the peace process, preaching and human rights within religious higher education. In March 2006 he was appointed Education Minister and Deputy Prime Minister of the Palestinian National Authority.Israel seizes West Bank Hamas men
''

BBC News BBC News is an operational business division of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs in the UK and around the world. The department is the world's largest broadca ...

''. BBC MMIX. 2009-03-19.

Attempt to assassinate him

Nasser Al-Shaer was subjected to an assassination attempt, on July 22, 2022, when gunmen fired from inside a vehicle that stopped in front of Al-Shaer's vehicle, wounding him with about 6 bullets in the legs. Polling after the event found that a plurality of the population attributed the killing to

Fatah Fatah ( ar, فتح '), formerly the Palestinian National Liberation Movement, is a Palestinian nationalist social democratic political party and the largest faction of the confederated multi-party Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and ...

or the

Palestinian security services The Palestinian Security Services (PSS) are the armed forces and intelligence agencies of the State of Palestine. They comprise several institutions, notably the Security Forces and the Police. The President of the Palestinian National Authori ...

Arrests

Shaer was first arrested at his home in

Ramallah Ramallah ( , ; ar, رام الله, , God's Height) is a Palestinian city in the central West Bank that serves as the ''de facto'' administrative capital of the State of Palestine. It is situated on the Judaean Mountains, north of Jerusale ...

Israel Defense Forces The Israel Defense Forces (IDF; he, צְבָא הַהֲגָנָה לְיִשְׂרָאֵל , ), alternatively referred to by the Hebrew-language acronym (), is the national military of the Israel, State of Israel. It consists of three servic ...

personnel on August 19, 2006, and was the highest-ranked of about sixty Hamas officials detained by Israel during the

2006 Israel-Gaza conflict 6 (six) is the natural number following 5 and preceding 7. It is a composite number and the smallest perfect number. In mathematics Six is the smallest positive integer which is neither a square number nor a prime number; it is the second small ...

. He was released without charges September 27 after a military court ruled that there was insufficient evidence against him to justify his arrest. Shaer was detained again on May 23, 2007 at his home in

by the IDF during overnight raids in the

West Bank The West Bank ( ar, الضفة الغربية, translit=aḍ-Ḍiffah al-Ġarbiyyah; he, הגדה המערבית, translit=HaGadah HaMaʽaravit, also referred to by some Israelis as ) is a landlocked territory near the coast of the Mediter ...

relating to the

Qassam rocket The Qassam rocket ( ar, صاروخ القسام ''Ṣārūkh al-Qassām''; also ''Kassam'') is a simple, steel artillery rocket developed and deployed by the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the military arm of Hamas. These rockets cannot be fired ...

fire towards Israel from

in the

Gaza Strip The Gaza Strip (;The New Oxford Dictionary of English (1998) – p.761 "Gaza Strip /'gɑːzə/ a strip of territory under the control of the Palestinian National Authority and Hamas, on the SE Mediterranean coast including the town of Gaza.. ...

. He was one of 33 Hamas officials that included a number of mayors and lawmakers to be arrested in a series of raids that day. He was released four months later. On March 19, 2009, al-Shaer and nine other high-ranking Hamas members in the West Bank were detained by Israeli authorities after prisoner exchange negotiations collapsed between Hamas and Israel. He was arrested in Nablus. According to news correspondents, the detentions appeared to be an Israeli attempt to pressure Hamas after the failure of the negotiations, although an Israeli military official said there was "no indication" the arrests were connected to the issue. Meanwhile, Hamas official Ahmed Bahar denounced the actions as "immoral blackmail by the Zionist occupation."

References

External links

Former Deputy PM Ash-Sha'er to be released from Israeli prison
{{DEFAULTSORT:Shaer, Nasser al- Living people Hamas members 1961 births Government ministers of the Palestinian National Authority Alumni of the University of Manchester New York University faculty Academic staff of An-Najah National University