Saleh Al-Arouri, the Deputy Head of the Political Bureau of the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement Hamas, was born on August 19, 1966, in the town of Arura in the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah.

Saleh Al-Arouri, the Deputy Head of the Political Bureau of the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement Hamas, was born on August 19, 1966, in the town of Arura in the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah.

Al-Arouri joined Hamas in 1987 and has been involved in various forms of resistance against the Israeli occupation since the movement's inception. He was detained without charge by the Israeli occupation forces in the years 1990, 1991, and 1992.

In 1992, Al-Arouri was detained and remained in jail until 2007, for a period of 15 years, on charges of forming the first cells of the Al-Qassam Brigades in the occupied West Bank. Three months after his release, he was re-arrested and put in jail for three more years until 2010, when the Israeli occupation Supreme Court decided to release him and deport him outside Palestine.

He was deported to Syria and resided there for three years before leaving for Turkey in February 2012. Since then, he has traveled to several Arab countries. As for many Palestinian citizens, Al-Arouri spent most of his life in the diaspora or in Israeli jails.  

Al-Arouri was elected as a member of the Political Bureau of Hamas in 2010. He was also part of the negotiating team involved in the prisoner exchange deal known as the ‘Shalit Deal’. In 2017, he was elected as the Deputy Head of the Political Bureau of Hamas.

Al-Arouri is described as a veteran political leader and one of the most influential figures in Hamas. Due to his charismatic personality and unique capacity to mobilise the Palestinian masses in the freedom struggle against the Israeli occupation, the occupation army declares that he is on top of the list of Palestinian freedom fighters it plans to assassinate.