Zuhayr ibn Abi Umayyah

Member of Quraysh who played the key public role in the breaking of the Boycott of Banū Hāshim. He was chosen by Hishām ibn ʿAmr to deliver the public challenge to Abū Jahl at the Nādī (the Meccan assembly) because he was genealogically most distant from the Banū Hāshim among the coalition members, making his motives appear less personal and more principled.

At the strategic gathering in the Nādī, he stood up and declared: "For how long are we going to starve our own kith and kin to death? This is an evil thing that we have done." Abū Jahl erupted. But then, one by one, the other coalition members stood up in pre-planned sequence, each denying that they had personally agreed to the boycott, each publicly challenging Abū Jahl's position. By the time the last man had stood, the assembly's mood had visibly shifted against Abū Jahl.

He does not appear to have accepted Islam. His motivation appears to have been tribal and ethical, Quraysh's honor was being tarnished by the spectacle of its own members starving.