Birth: NULL/NULL/1860 Death:NULL/NULL/1940
Born in Acre in 1860; graduated in Religious Law from Al-Azhar University, Cairo, in the late 1870s; worked as a judge in the Ottoman judiciary in Shafa Amr, Galilee, and in Ladhaqiyya, Syria; supported the unity of the Ottoman Empire; moved to Istanbul in 1905 and worked in the library of Sultan Abdul Hamid II; later became a judge in Adana, Anatolia; was a member of the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP), for which he opened a branch in Jerusalem; was elected representative of Acre to the Ottoman parliament in 1908 and 1912 (until 1914); was an active and influential opposition member; joined the scientific delegation from Syria, Palestine and Lebanon to Istanbul in Sept. 1915, marking the highlight of his career; held many positions in the Ottoman religious judiciary in Palestine, incl. member of the Shari’a Inquiries Court at Istanbul; was appointed Mufti for the Ottoman Fourth Army under Jamal Pasha in Syria-Palestine during WWI; returned to Haifa; was arrested by the British as former Ottoman official and imprisoned in Alexandria for 14 months; returned to Acre upon his release in 1921; became a supporter of Al-Hizb Al-Watani (National Party) founded in 1923; founded the Liberal Party (Hizb Al-Ahrar) in 1930; became head of the Supreme Muslim Council during the British Mandate; was an active member and leader of the pro-mu’arada faction and became their pillar in the north of the country; was a member of the National Defense Party (Hizb Ad-Difa’a Al-Watani) founded in 1934; when Mustafa Kamal, the Father of Modern Turkey, took over, he presented Sheikh As’ad with chests filled with Arabic books and writings; father of Ahmad Shuqeiri who later became the first head of the PLO; died in 1940.
