Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade Commander Slain By IDF Is Buried In Black Flag Typical Of Salafi-Jihadi Organizations

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On July 3, 2024, the West Bank-based Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, the military wing of the Palestinian Fatah movement, released a statement announcing the death of Nidal Ziad Al-'Amer, a senior member of the organization in the Jenin Governorate, located in the northern West Bank. According to the statement, he was killed in an operation carried out by Special Forces of "the Zionist occupation."[1]Nidal was the son of Ziad Al-'Amer, who was also a senior member of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, who was killed in Jenin in 2002, and a cousin of the brothers Ayham and Aysar Al-'Amer, who were also killed by the IDF in Jenin, in late 2023.

On July 3 and 4, 2024, local Arab news channels on Telegram and on X shared short videos from Al-'Amer's funeral, which was held on July 3 in Jenin. Unusually, the body was seen wrapped in a black flag typically used by Sunni jihadi terrorist organizations, such as the Islamic State (ISIS) and Al-Qaeda, as opposed to a Palestinian flag. Moreover, many of the people at the funeral were seen pointing upward with their index finger in an Islamic gesture which denotes the indivisible oneness of Allah, which is customarily used by members of ISIS.[2]

Ikhbariyat, an Arab X account that shared footage of the funeral, noted that Nidal's cousin, Ayham Al-'Amer – who, as mentioned above was also killed by the IDF – had resigned from his position with the Palestinian Authority (PA), claiming that it cooperated with Israel. Ayham was even arrested by the PA and served time in prison, but he escaped and returned to his life as a fighter until he was killed by the IDF. Like Nidal, at his funeral he was also filmed wearing a symbol of the organizations that call for jihad, in his case, a headband.[3]

Another Arab Telegram channel, known as The Wasps' Nest – the Jenin Refugee Camp, describes Al-'Amar as a devout Muslim, but does not mention any connection between him and any jihadi terrorist organization.[4]