Abu Ibrahim worked as a laborer of sorts in Haifa. It was at that time, in the 1920s, that he became a close disciple of Izz ad-Din al-Qassam. Al-Qassam had been organizing the peasants and urban dwellers of northern Palestine into an armed movement. Abu Ibrahim advocated that the movement should have commenced a revolt against the British colonial authorities in Palestine immediately in the wake of the 1929 riots so as not to allow the British an opportunity to further clamp down and weaken the Palestinian community.