Raed Salah. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.

JNS.org – The head of the northern branch of the Islamic Movement in Israel, Raed Salah, was released from Megiddo prison on Monday after serving time for incitement to terrorism.

Salah was greeted with fireworks and a crowd of around 1,000 supporters chanting, “Raed, the sheikh of Al-Aqsa,” upon his return to his home city of Umm al-Fahm near Haifa, reported Ynet.

He served 17 months of a 28-month sentence, though it was not his first time in jail.

Opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu tweeted a news report stating that senior members of the southern branch of the Islamic Movement’s political party, the United Arab List (or Ra’am in Hebrew), which serves in the current government, blessed the release of the radical cleric.

“The [Naftali] Bennett [coalition] government and the Islamic movement are breaking another record of shame,” tweeted Netanyahu.

The Islamic Movement in Israel, which Salah founded in 1971, has been outlawed by the Israeli authorities since 2015.