Red Tuesday — the executions at Acre prison
On 17 June 1930 the British Mandate hanged Fuad Hijazi, Muhammad Jamjoum and Atta al-Zir at Acre prison for the events of August 1929. The day entered Palestinian memory through the songs sung for them — above all the funeral song from Acre prison that is still sung a century later.
After the Buraq uprising of August 1929, British Mandate courts tried hundreds of Palestinians. Three of the condemned — Fuad Hijazi, Muhammad Jamjoum and Atta al-Zir — were sentenced to death, and on 17 June 1930 the Mandate hanged them at Acre prison. The Institute for Palestine Studies keeps Hijazi’s photograph in its encyclopedia of the Palestine question; the caption records the simple fact that has carried the day into memory: “The British Mandate sentenced three rebels to death on the 17th of June 1930. They were Mohammad Jamjoom, Atta al-Zir, and Fu’ad Hijazi.”
The executions did not pass into silence. They passed into song. The funeral lament that begins “from Acre prison the funeral went out” — min sijn ʿAkka — named Jamjoum and Hijazi in its opening lines and spread through Palestine and the Arab world; it has been performed continuously since, most famously by Firqat al-ʿAshiqin, and is sung to this day at commemorations, in the camps, and by prisoners. The day itself is remembered as Red Tuesday, the title the poet Ibrahim Tuqan gave his elegy for the three men.
The three hanged men of 1930 stand at the head of a longer line. The Palestinian prisoners’ movement traces its own roots to them: as the researcher Ra’fat Hamdouna argues in the movement’s own historiography, its story is not limited to the post-1967 prisons but goes back to the Mandate — to Acre, to the men of 1930, to Farhan al-Saadi executed in 1937 and Yusuf Abu Durra in 1939. What began at the gallows of Acre continued as the organised movement inside Israeli prisons that turned captivity into what its members call an academy.
Sources
Cited works
2- palquest.org — martyr fuad hijazi(opens in a new tab)https://www.palquest.org/en/media/10791/martyr-fuad-hijazi
- solidarity-ps.org — The Palestinian Prisoners Movement(opens in a new tab)https://www.solidarity-ps.org/en/The_Palestinian_Prisoners_Movement
Connected in the archive
12 connected records12 records elsewhere in the archive are linked to this one, each by a piece of evidence you can read below.
named in this record — 7 records
One record names the other. A pointer for reading, not a claim that they belong to each other.
- Acreعكا
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: The funeral lament that begins "from Acre prison the funeral went out" — min sijn ʿAkka — named Jamjoum and Hijazi in its opening lines and spread through Palestine and the Arab world; it has been performed continuously since, most famously by Firqat al-ʿAshiqin, and is sung to this day at commemorations, in the camps, and by prisoners.
- Atta al-Zirعطا الزير
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Three of the condemned — Fuad Hijazi, Muhammad Jamjoum and Atta al-Zir — were sentenced to death, and on 17 June 1930 the Mandate hanged them at Acre prison.
- Farhan al-Saadiفرحان السعدي
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: The Palestinian prisoners' movement traces its own roots to them: as the researcher Ra'fat Hamdouna argues in the movement's own historiography, its story is not limited to the post-1967 prisons but goes back to the Mandate — to Acre, to the men of 1930, to Farhan al-Saadi executed in 1937 and Yusuf Abu Durra in 1939.
- Fuad Hijaziفؤاد حجازي
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Three of the condemned — Fuad Hijazi, Muhammad Jamjoum and Atta al-Zir — were sentenced to death, and on 17 June 1930 the Mandate hanged them at Acre prison.
- Ibrahim Tuqanإبراهيم طوقان
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: The day itself is remembered as Red Tuesday, the title the poet Ibrahim Tuqan gave his elegy for the three men.
- Muhammad Jamjoumمحمد جمجوم
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Three of the condemned — Fuad Hijazi, Muhammad Jamjoum and Atta al-Zir — were sentenced to death, and on 17 June 1930 the Mandate hanged them at Acre prison.
- and 1 more
names this record — 5 records
One record names the other. A pointer for reading, not a claim that they belong to each other.
- Red Tuesday and the Songs of the Prison
Evidence — From a recorded field in this archive: 17 June 1930: Fuad Hijazi, Muhammad Jamjoum and Atta al-Zir are hanged at Acre. The Institute for Palestine Studies keeps the record of the sentence.
- From Acre Prison
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: The mourning was national; the poet Ibrahim Tuqan named the day Red Tuesday.
- Nuh Ibrahimنوح إبراهيم
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: Ibrahim Tuqan, the most celebrated poet in Palestine at the time, wrote his own elegy for the same three men and gave the day its name, Red Tuesday; but it is not Tuqan's classical lines Palestinians know by heart.
- Red Tuesday
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: The one that named the day was Ibrahim Tuqan's, and the name stuck: al-Thulatha' al-Hamra', Red Tuesday.
- The Martyr's Testament
Evidence — Inferred from the text — read the evidence: What came out of the Acre executions was not a period of national mourning but a song, and a poem by Ibrahim Tuqan that gave the day the name it still carries, Red Tuesday.
Cite this page
Every claim above carries its sources — citation is the point.
- Chicago
“Red Tuesday — the executions at Acre prison.” Timeline, FALASTEEN.AI. Accessed 22 August 2026. https://falasteen.ai/timeline/red-tuesday-1930.- MLA
“Red Tuesday — the executions at Acre prison.” Timeline, FALASTEEN.AI, 2026, https://falasteen.ai/timeline/red-tuesday-1930. Accessed 22 August 2026.- BibTeX
@misc{falasteen-red-tuesday-1930, title = {Red Tuesday — the executions at Acre prison}, howpublished = {\url{https://falasteen.ai/timeline/red-tuesday-1930}}, organization = {FALASTEEN.AI — A Living Archive for Palestine}, year = {2026}, note = {Accessed 2026-08-22} }