The US ‘ally’ that protects a murderer of Americans - by Stephen M. Flatow

We are constantly told that Jordan is crucial to regional security. That may be, but what kind of “ally” shelters a murderer of Americans—and then gives the murderer her own television show?

Stephen M. Flatow..
JNS.org..
02 March '20..

At first glance, you might not think there was anything very significant about the recent trial of a little-known Muslim imam in the Czech Republic.

Samer Shehadeh, a Palestinian Arab who is serving as a Muslim religious leader in Prague, was sentenced last week to 10 years in prison for giving financial assistance to Al-Nusra—the Syrian affiliate of Al-Qaeda—and helping his brother and sister-in-law join that terrorist group.

But the most important part of the story was not the trial, the verdict or the sentencing. It was how Shehadeh was captured. Way down near the end of the news accounts of the case, we learned: “Shehadeh was arrested in Jordan before being flown back to the Czech Republic and taken into custody in November 2018.”

Now compare Jordan’s extradition of Samer Shehadeh with its refusal to extradite another Palestinian Arab terrorist.

On Aug. 9, 2001, terrorists bombed the Sbarro pizzeria in downtown Jerusalem. Fifteen people were killed and 130 wounded. Three of the fatalities were American citizens, including 15 year-old Malki Roth. One of the perpetrators, Ahlam Tamimi, lives in Jordan and used to have her own TV show. The United States has requested her extradition. Jordan’s King Abdullah has refused.

Whenever Malki’s parents have raised this issue with State Department officials or leaders of certain Jewish organizations, they have been told that Abdullah can’t extradite any Palestinian Arab terrorists because the population of Jordan consists mostly of Palestinian Arabs, and they will overthrow him if he surrenders any terrorists.

“And, after all,” these apologists tell the grieving parents, “if Abdullah is overthrown, Jordan could become radicalized and that would be bad for Israel, and you wouldn’t want to hurt Israel, would you?”

Now we see that such excuses are not only insulting and patronizing, they are also patently disingenuous. The Shehadeh case clearly demonstrates that Abdullah is perfectly capable of extraditing a Palestinian Arab terrorist without suffering any repercussions.

Abdullah’s decision to harbor Ahlam Tamimi, a woman who brags about her role in murder, is a matter of choice.

(Continue to Full Column)

Stephen M. Flatow, an attorney in New Jersey, is the father of Alisa Flatow, who was murdered in an Iranian-sponsored Palestinian terrorist attack in 1995.

Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work. 

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A U.S. elected official, a Jordanian king, a terrorist and the feeling of talking to a wall - by Arnold Roth

With few exceptions, mainstream editors and reporters in the news industry won't touch this battle we as bereaved parents are waging to see our child's killer stand trial in Washington on the US Federal charges she faces. But we plan to keep pressing on. For us, it's a matter of justice.

Arnold/Frimet Roth..
This Ongoing War..
16 December '19..

About six weeks ago, we noticed a Jordanian news report about an official visit to the sumptuous palace of Jordan's ruler by a senior US Congressman, Representative Adam Smith.

A Democrat, Smith represents Washington state's 9th Congressional district. Before that he served in the Washington State Senate. He has been a member of the House Armed Services Committee since 1997 and is its current chairman.

The details of his formal visit to the royal palace appeared on the website of Jordan's embassy in Washington DC. They also appeared on the website of Jordan's Royal Hashemite Court and a little later in the government-controlled Jordan Times.

We noted and commented on the visit here.

Smith's was one of three Congressional Delegation visits to the royal place in Amman that we know of between the first week of October and the first week of November. There may have been others that we didn't spot. We're new to the business of tracking the activities of US Congress people when they're outside the US. The US new media seem to pay them little attention.

Why is this an issue for us?

If you know anything about our blog, you will be aware that Jordan is refusing to extradite the Islamist savage who bombed the Sbarro pizzeria in Jerusalem. And that this flies in the face of years of Jordan complying with the bilateral extradition treaty that has been in effect since 1995.

Our 15 year old daughter Malki was one of the many children inside the pizzeria who were blown to pieces. Ahlam Tamimi, whom we consider a monster, has taken credit for years - on television, in the print media, on multiple social media platforms - for selecting the site (the large number of Jewish children was the key factor) and for personally bringing the bomb to the door of the pizzeria just before fleeing to save herself. She calls it "my operation" and has never denied the charges. She has publicly and repeatedly confessed.

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Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work. 

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Israel and the issue of preserving the peace with Jordan - by Caroline Glick

Jordan’s actions over the past several weeks reinforce what has been clear for some time. In its rush to protect Abdullah and the peace, Israel has forgotten to deter Abdullah to preserve the peace. The time has come for Israel to correct its behavior. (Including requiring Jordan to  extradite the terrorist Ahlam Tamimi - YH)

Caroline Glick..
Carolineglick.com..
06 December '19..
Link: http://carolineglick.com/preserving-the-peace-with-jordan/

Tuesday Israel’s Channel 13 reported that President Donald Trump’s Deputy National Security Advisor Victoria Coates held a meeting at the White House last week with the ambassadors of Oman, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Morocco. She reportedly asked the emissaries to check whether their governments are willing to consider signing non-aggression pacts with Israel.

The story, which the White House did not deny indicates the Trump administration has embraced an Israeli initiative, raised publicly last month by Foreign Minister Yisrael Katz. The idea is that through the non-aggression pacts, which are less than peace treaties, Israel and its Arab neighbors will be able to sidestep the issue of formal relations, replete with embassy opening ceremonies, and simply engage in open relations, for the benefit of all sides.

This has been the central goal of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s diplomatic strategy. For decades, foreign policy practitioners and activitists in the U.S., Europe and the Israeli left have insisted that peace between Israel and the larger Arab world is impossible so long as Israel has not concluded a peace treaty with the PLO. This view gives the PLO the power to dictate if, when and under what conditions Arab nations will be “allowed” to have normal relations with the Jewish state.

Netanyahu’s goal has long been to rescind the PLO’s veto. By working behind the scenes to build constructive, stable ties with the states of the region predicated on mutual interests, Netanyahu has made great strides in achieving this goal. The very fact that Coates reportedly held the meeting with the Arab ambassadors in the White House is testament to the success of his efforts.

The dimensions of Netanyahu’s achievement are clear when you compare Israel’s constructive, mutually beneficial ties with states with which it lacks formal peace treaties to Israel’s ties with Jordan.

In recent remarks before a Knesset meeting marking the 25th anniversary of the signing of Israel’s peace treaty with Jordan, Netanyahu explained that the basis of Israel’s peaceful relations with Egypt and Jordan is not emotional. The Egyptians and Jordanians haven’t embraced Israel as a neighbor and friend. Rather, Israel’s peace treaties are the products of its deterrent power.

In his words, “As long as we are stronger – they are with us. If we become weaker, then the peace agreements will hang by a thread.”

That means that practically speaking there is little substantive difference between Israel’s ties with say, the UAE, and Israel’s ties with Egypt. So long as both perceive Israel as strong and helpful, and impossible to destroy, they will have good relations with it. If Israel becomes a strategic basket case on the other hand, then those relations will rapidly deteriorate.

In Egypt’s case, the combination of Israeli strength and shared interests in combatting Iran and the Muslim Brotherhood improved relations to an unprecedented degree. Acting on these shared interests and his recognition of Israeli power, Egyptian President Abdel el-Fattah a-Sisi played a significant role in cultivating ties between the Sunni Gulf states and Israel.

Jordan is a different story. While Israel’s relations with Egypt have never been better, its relations with Jordan have never been worse. Indeed, Israel’s informal ties with Saudi Arabia today are arguably better than its formal ties with Jordan. So what is going on? Is Israel doing something wrong? What does it get out of its ties with Jordan to begin with?

The most important advantage Israel gains from its ties with Jordan is a long peaceful eastern frontier. But that peaceful border, which is a function of Israel’s control of the Jordan Valley on the one hand and to Jordan’s actions to secure its border with Israel on the other, predates the peace treaty by more than 20 years. Moreover, given the downward trajectory of bilateral ties, it’s hard to know how long Jordan will remain committed to securing the border. From week to week, Jordan’s growing hostility towards Israel become more difficult to countenance or explain away.

Consider events of the past three weeks.

It says $5 million for information leading to her arrest or conviction! When do I get my money? - by Dexter Van Zile

And so there you have it. Ahlam Tamimi, a woman who has bragged of murdering Jewish children, lives as a hero, out in the open, in her native Jordan.The $5 million reward for information leading to her arrest doesn’t mean a damn thing. Everyone knows what she did. Everyone knows where she lives. And unless somebody decides to cancel the Jew Exception, Tamimi will evade prosecution for her role in the murder of US citizens.

Dexter Van Zile..
Algemeiner..
27 November '19..

I am going to need a financial adviser.

In a few months I’m going to get a check from the US government for $5 million.

Here’s how it’s going to work. Right after I submit this article to The Algemeiner, I’m going to call the local FBI office and tell whoever picks up the phone that one of their most wanted terrorists, Ahlam Tamimi, is living in Jordan — a country which, conveniently enough, has an extradition treaty with the United States.

“I saw the wanted poster for Tamimi on the Internet,” I’ll tell them. “It says $5 million for information leading to her arrest or conviction! When do I get my money? Do you need my routing number for my bank account?”

Once paperwork is completed and the FBI is alerted to Tamimi’s location, the agency will put a call in to the US State Department which will contact King Abdullah II of Jordan, a moderate opposed to terrorism. And for sure, King Abdullah will do the right thing and put her on a plane to the US. A few days later, I’ll get my money and call my newfound financial advisor who will tell me where to invest so I will never have to work again.

We’re talking inter-generational wealth here!

I just hope that Tamimi’s neighbors in Jordan haven’t called the US Embassy in Amman to try and collect the money! It’s a real possibility. Not only did the FBI produce wanted posters in English, they printed them in Arabic as well. Maybe one of Tamimi’s neighbors in Jordan will turn her in and deprive me of my reward!

Get real.

(Continue to Full Column)

Dexter Van Zile is Christian Media Analyst for the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting and Analysis.

Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work. 

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Why this sweeping acceptance of King Abdullah's terror-abetting conduct? - by Frimet Roth

My husband and I, for whom Malki's murder remains the source of deep pain, are utterly baffled by this sweeping acceptance of King Abdullah's terror-abetting conduct. But we will never cease our struggle to arouse national leaders and news industry magnates. After all, like every other murder victim, Malki deserves justice.

Frimet Roth..
The Good, The Bad, The Ugly..
26 November '19..

Here I was, convinced that one of the basic tenets of American democracy is the rejection of monarchic rule. But it seems I erred.

These days, the Jordanian ruler, King Abdullah II, enjoys the fulsome adulation and praise one would expect for a selfless hero who has rescued a dozen children from a blazing building.

He is feted repeatedly at the White House. Bi-partisan delegations from the US Congress fly to his Amman palace to honor him. Leaders of major Jewish organizations attend his conferences and breakfasts. Numerous international media outlets extol his virtue and wisdom.

And last week, the esteemed US think tank the Washington Institute for Near Policy handed him its Scholar Statesman Award.

All of this, in itself, is puzzling.

But what makes it infuriating is that the recipient of that adulation is a dictator - yes, that's what an unelected ruler is, king or not - who has defied the U.S. Department of Justice.

He refuses to extradite one of the FBI's Most Wanted terrorists.

He denies the validity of a treaty of extradition signed and ratified by his father, King Hussein, with the US - a treaty which the US State Department says unequivocally is in force.

Add to that mix the fact that the terrorist whom Abdullah is embracing is the mass murderer and Hamas operative, Ahlam Tamimi, who has boasted numerous times of her evil "achievement" to her admirers on TV broadcasts.

The terror bombing she orchestrated slaughtered sixteen innocents, including eight children. One of those, my precious Malki, was 15 years old when this monster took her from us. Malki was a citizen of the United States.

(Continue to Full Post)

Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work. 

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On the Kingdom of Jordan, the US and the children killed in a pizzeria - by Arnold Roth

Coming from the autocrat who keeps our child's killer, who confesses for the record to the bombing, safe and out of the clutches of the US Justice Department, the FBI and the Federal courts of the United States, the hypocrisy and sheer dishonesty on display here is frankly nauseating.

Arnold/Frimet Roth..
This Ongoing War..
12 November '19..

Nine days ago, the US State Department made an announcement that has a significant impact on our ongoing efforts to have our child's killer brought to justice in the United States.

We wrote about it here: "03-Nov-19: In Washington, a step towards bringing the Sbarro bomber to justice".

Shortly afterwards, the Washington editor at Haaretz, Amir Tibon, did what we think is a fine job of giving the State Department statement some context. It appeared online (text below) on November 3, and in the paper edition.

U.S. Rejects Jordan's Refusal to Extradite Hamas Terrorist Wanted for Trial

Development could lead to further American pressure on Amman to extradite Ahlam Tamimi, who played a major role in organizing the Sbarro attack in Jerusalem in 2001

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Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work. 

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A dream that cries out for justice - by Frimet Roth

I urge any Congresspeople or White House officials now contemplating a tete a tete with the terror- abetting Jordanian dictator to remember my child, Malki and the fifteen other victims that Tamimi boasts publicly of murdering.

Frimet Roth..
The Good, the Bad, the Ugly..
10 November '19..

Last week my Malki appeared to me in a dream - as she has only done some four times in the past 18 years.

She felt so close and alive. I welcomed her warmly but with deep reservations, sensing that for some unarticulated reason her stay would be limited. But it was a joy to have her in our midst again.

I remarked to her that she probably only had a basic cellphone and assured her I'd get her a smartphone. On the day of the terror bombing in which she perished, I frantically called her phone in vain for many long hours. My husband reassured me that cell phone lines were all down as a result of the ataack; no need for concern.

So it's no wonder I commented about her phone in my dream.

My apparition of Malki told me she was about to leave on a school trip for a while but I urged her to give that a miss and stay home with the family instead.
Then I awoke, sad, bereft, disappointed, cheated afresh - a feeling I can't truly convey since only a bereaved parent would comprehend it.

Nonetheless, I would like to transmit this dream somehow to the three congressional delegations that flew to Jordan in the past month to honor and praise its dictator, King Abdullah II. Each of them praised him fulsomely for, among other achievements, his commitment to fighting terrorism.

None of the US legislators hinted at, let alone expressly referred to, his regime's refusal to comply with the US Department of Justice's 2017 demand for the extradition of one of the FBI's Ten Most Wanted Terrorists, Ahlam Tamimi.

(Continue to Full Post)

Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work. 

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Another US Congress delegation visits Jordan's royal court. Did extradition of Ahlam al-Tamimi come up? - by Arnold Roth

No response to our numerous messages to each of the members of the Pelosi delegation has been received. None. Not even an acknowledgment. We expect a higher degree of transparency and responsiveness from Congress people doing the business of the nation when calling on foreign leaders. And that's before we start trying to explain to people how soul-destroying it is to be a bereaved family trying to bring a child's confessed killer to justice and running into endless US government roadblocks.

Arnold/Frimet Roth..
This Ongoing War..
09 November '19..

This post looks at yet another US Congressional delegation to fly into Jordan and meet with its king - the third such high level political mission in the past month.

As bereaved parents battling for years to get the criminally-indicted fugitive bomber who led the attack on a pizzeria sent to trial in Washington [see "20-Mar-17: The Hashemite Kingdom's courts have spoken: The murdering FBI fugitive will not be handed over"], we pay close attention to which American politicians visit Jordan.

The following account comes from the website of Jordan's embassy in Washington DC, and originates with Jordan's Royal Hashemite Court:

(Continue to Full Post)

Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work. 

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Still harboring the Sbarro pizzeria bomber, Jordan's inscrutable US relationship - by Arnold Roth

Jordan continues, despite the outrageous finger-in-the-American-eye, to be treated by the United States as if nothing had happened. Our objections, as the parents of a child, a US citizen, murdered in the Sbarro massacre, are for all practical purposes ignored.The government-controlled Jordan Times has just produced the next chapter in this ongoing process of US self-debasement.

Arnold/Frimet Roth..
This Ongoing War..
08 October '19..

The Jordanian government harbors and safeguards within its borders the Sbarro pizzeria bomber, Ahlam Tamimi, a Hamas jihad agent. It has been doing this since at least March 2017, days after the US Department of Justice unveiled terrorism charges against her and announced that it had called on Jordan to extradite her under their 1995 treaty.

Since then, and despite repeated efforts by us - Frimet and Arnold Roth whose daughter Malki was murdered in the terror attack masterminded by Tamimi - the US government has not once stated publicly in any form or any language that it views Jordan's unstated failure to extradite as being in clear breach of the 1995 Extradition Treaty signed by the two countries.

From US law enforcement services, we have learned that they are ready to take Tamimi into custody. The problem is Jordan won't allow it.

We have written polite and carefully drafted letters to a variety of senior officials in the Department of Justice, to officials in the State Department, to the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, to a variety of US diplomats posted in the Middle East. Not one of these has produced a satisfactory response, no matter how generously "satisfactory" is defined.

Jordan continues, despite the outrageous finger-in-the-American-eye, to be treated by the United States as if nothing had happened. Our objections, as the parents of a child, a US citizen, murdered in the Sbarro massacre, are for all practical purposes ignored.

The government-controlled Jordan Times has just produced the next chapter in this ongoing process of US self-debasement.

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Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work. 

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Jordan's King Abdullah says that no crisis has done more global damage than "Palestinian-Israeli conflict" - by Elder of Ziyon

Israel has done far more to save and preserve Muslim history in Jerusalem than King Hussein ever did. The difference is that Israel also preserves Jewish history, and King Hussein and his father before him did everything they could to erase that. The hypocrisy is off the charts. And this is the "moderate" Jordan, with a king who seems cool and modern with excellent English.

Elder of Ziyon..
27 September '19..

Jordan's King Abdullah, in his speech to the UN, said literally nothing about Jordan.

Most of his speech was to support "Palestine" and to insult Israel.

But this section was so over the top as to sound like a parody:

My friends,
Collective action is also vital for ending bitter crises and conflicts. And no crisis has done more global damage than the core conflict in my region, the Palestinian-Israeli conflict

Global damage?

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Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work. 

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Fugitive Jordanian Bomber: With Jordan's King Abdullah II visiting the United States again, things worth knowing - by Arnold Roth

Jordan has never refused to extradite until the Tamimi case. Indeed it has extradited a string of Jordanian terrorists who are now imprisoned in the US. So what makes Tamimi different? We think it's that she is the first Jordanian whose extradition was requested by the US and who confesses openly to have specifically targeted Jews in the attack. Jewish children, to be more exact about it.

Arnold/Frimet Roth..
This Ongoing War..
18 September '19..

This week, as he has done for several years, Jordan's absolute ruler is in New York, ostensibly to attend and to speak at the annual opening session of the UN General Assembly.

It is possible he will be officially received in the US halls of power again as he has on his many previous visits. Given the context, this is surprising - even bizarre.

We are the parents of Malki Roth whose confessed killer, a Jordanian woman called Ahlam Tamimi, lives free as a bird under the explicit protection of the Jordanian government. This despite her having facing US Federal terrorism charges and being on the FBI's Most Wanted Terrorist list. She is a Jordanian celebrity - not despite the bombing she masterminded in Jerusalem that was intended to kill as many Jewish children as possible but because of it.

(Continue to Full Post)

Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work. 

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Understanding Jordan's ruler King Abdullah II and his "holistic" approach to terror - by Arnold Roth

...And what does the Royal Hashemite Palace and its central personage say to all this? Nothing, and nor can we expect them to for so long as he and they continue to be absurdly feted as central players in their "holistic" struggle to defeat the terrorists. Just so long as they're not Jordanian terrorists.

Arnold/Frimet Roth..
This Ongoing War..
03 December '17..

Regular readers know we pay more than the usual amount of attention to the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. It's where our daughter Malki's murderer lives free as a bird.

And even though

- she has boasted over and again for the cameras and the media of her central role in the 2001 bombing attack on the people inside Jerusalem's Sbarro pizzeria; and

- she confessed in an Israeli court in 2003 to the calculated murder of 15 innocent victims, most of them children, and to having done this on behalf of the Islamist terror regime, Hamas, whose first-ever female terror agent she is reputed to be; and

- the US government, the US Department of Justice and the FBI want her arrested and extradited to face Federal charges in a Washington court

Jordan's ruler King Abdullah II, aware of her celebrity status among his people, has stubbornly presided over a series of measures whose effect is to spit in the eye of the Americans, to deny the validity of the 1995 Jordan/US Extradition Treaty and to ensure one of his kingdom's - and the Arab world's - most admired females remains free to pursue her career of incitement to terrorism, Islamist values and the murder of Jewish children.

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Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work. 

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The King of Jordan doesn't need to fly to Paris to stand with terror victims

...There are going to be many leaders at Sunday's mass rally in Paris and their message is essentially the same as the one we are waiting to hear from Jordan. All in all, we think the Jordanians will gain hugely if their monarch stays home and addresses a problem that none of those other VIPs can.

2012 graduating class at Jordan Media Institute.
Its founder, HRH Princess Rym Ali
addresses the audience [Image Source]

Arnold/Frimet Roth..
This Ongoing War..
11 January '15..

An announcement a few hours ago says Jordan's king and queen are going to attend a mass national rally in Paris on Sunday in tribute to the 17 victims of "a three-day Islamist killing spree". Agence France Press adds that

Some 45 foreign leaders and officials will be present at the historic march in the French capital, which is expected to attract around a million people under high security.

We understand how joining such august company has its attractions. But respectfully, we think HRH King Abdullah II of the Hashemite Kingdom could make a more meaningful contribution to the cause by staying home and taking steps well within his power on behalf of the victims of an earlier Islamist killing spree much closer to (his) home. Here's why.

(Continue)

Updates throughout the day at http://calevbenyefuneh.blogspot.com. If you enjoy "Love of the Land", please be a subscriber. Just put your email address in the "Subscribe" box on the upper right-hand corner of the page.Twitter updates at LoveoftheLand as well as our Love of the Land page at Facebook which has additional pieces of interest besides that which is posted on the blog. Also check-out This Ongoing War by Frimet and Arnold Roth. An excellent blog, very important work as well as a big vote to follow our good friend Kay Wilson on Twitter, 
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Zahran - A Plan B for Jordan?

Mudar Zahran
Hudson New York
16 September '11

http://www.hudson-ny.org/2429/jordan-plan-b


The King of Jordan, Abdullah II, delivered a speech on September 11, in which he mentioned the Jordanian civil war of 1970 for the first time ever: "There are not any issues we are too embarrassed to discuss, even if there is someone who wants to discuss the incidents of 1970, this is a part of history; let us think of the future and not the past."

Commenting on the fear of Jordan's Bedouin minority -- who make up the king's military and are the protected class -- that Jordan might become the Palestinian majority's homeland -- a plan dubbed "the alternative homeland" by the local media -- the king said: "I would like to assure everyone that Jordan will not be an alternative country to anyone. Is it even logical that Jordan will become an alternative to anyone while we sit there and do nothing? We have an army and we are willing to fight for our country and for the future of Jordan, and we must speak vigorously and not ever allow this idea to remain in the minds of some of us….We have fought Israel before many times."

"Jordan and the future of Palestine," he added, "are much stronger than Israel today; the Israeli is the one who is afraid….When I was in the United States, I spoke to an Israeli intellectual; he told me that what was happening in Arab countries today is in the interests of Israel. I told him, 'I think it is the opposite: your situation today is much harder than before.'"

King Abdullah also mentioned the need to address the issue of "national identity" in Jordan -- a phrase associated with isolating the Palestinians, who make up 80% of the population, in favor of the Beduin minority, for whom he would establish Jordan as a purely Bedouin state: "We must speak with a loud voice about the Jordanian identity," he said, "yet national unity is a red line." In other words, the king openly supports talk about imposing a Jordanian Bedouin identity on the country, while at the same time prohibiting any "unity" with the Palestinians -- a notion he had previously denounced.

Shine - King Abdullah fears the Arab Spring

Chaim Shine
Israel Hayom
13 September '11

http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=481

King Abdullah II of Jordan, addressing recent developments in the region, claimed this week that Israel is worse off in the wake of the Arab Spring. "The futures of Jordan and Palestine are more certain and solid than that of Israel," Abdullah said, adding that Israelis are the ones who are frightened nowadays. I tried really hard to find these frightened Israelis on the street, but could not.

The Talmud says that every man reveals his heart's ruminations when he speaks, and indeed, King Abdullah is scared. He fears the possibility that the small emirate received by his great-grandfather King Abdullah I from the British, in recognition of his cooperation with them against the Turks during World War I, could disappear. A political flood is sweeping the Arab world toward absolute chaos, and no one knows where it will end.

Until 1948, the population of Jordan was composed of half a million Bedouin tribesmen, inhabiting vast swathes of desert. To this day, Bedouin tribesman constitute the anchor of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, serving in its army and security forces. The Bedouin's loyalty is the only thing guaranteeing the royal family's continued rule. But this is a conditional loyalty, similar to that of Saddam Hussein, Mubarak and Gadhafi loyalists.

After the War of Independence, in which the Jordanian army took an active role in the coordinated attack by the Arab states against Israel, the cease-fire lines were established. Those lines gave birth to the area known as the West Bank, which Israelis call Judea and Samaria, which Jordan controlled and annexed in 1950. Only two states officially recognized the annexation: the U.K. and Pakistan. Until the Six Day War, Palestinian residents of Judea and Samaria lived under Jordanian rule. They joined hundreds of thousands of Palestinian refugees who crossed over into Jordan during the War of Independence, in the hopes of returning to Israel, from which they fled, following promises by their leaders that Israel would soon be destroyed.

Daphne Anson - Jeopardising Jordan

Daphne Anson
10 July '11

http://daphneanson.blogspot.com/2011/07/jeopardising-jordan.html

The latest incisive article by Sydney lawyer David Singer, a founder member of the International Analysts Network, is entitled "Jordan – Abbas Offers Abdullah The Kiss Of Death". The article comes via the antipodean J-Wire service.

Writes David Singer:

'Jordan’s King Abdullah is clearly worried about the future direction of his country – if developments over recent weeks are any indication.

His Majesty told the Washington Post on 16 June:

“2011 will be, I think, a very bad year for peace, Although we will continue to try to bring both sides to the table, I am the most pessimistic I have been in 11 years.”

Whilst the Palestinian Authority refuses to resume negotiations with Israel any hope of peacefully resolving sovereignty in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza will deteriorate and the King‘s pessimism will become self-fulfilling.

The absence of any such negotiations impacts on Jordan (known as Transjordan until 1950) because of its following historic, geographic and demographic ties with the West Bank and East Jerusalem:

Jordan comprises 78% of former Palestine – whilst Israel comprises 17%. The remaining 5% comprises the West Bank and Gaza.

Jordan’s population is overwhelmingly comprised of Arabs (or their descendants) who fled the invasion of Palestine by six Arab armies (including Jordan) in 1948.

Jordan was the last Arab occupier of the West Bank and East Jerusalem from 1948-1967 – driving out all the Jews who had lived there prior to 1948.

In 1950 a joint parliament comprised equally of members from the West Bank and Transjordan voted to unify the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Transjordan into one state which was renamed Jordan – and it remained so unified until the loss of the West Bank to Israel in the 1967 Six Day War. Only Great Britain and Pakistan recognized such union but it flourished unchallenged for 17 years.

West Bank Arab residents became Jordanian citizens and enjoyed that status from 1950 until 1988 – when Jordan finally relinquished all claims to the West Bank – but not its custodianship of the holy sites in East Jerusalem.

Jordan has kept its territorial claims alive to the West Bank and East Jerusalem as a result of clause 2 [A] of Annex 1 (a) of the peace treaty it signed with Israel in 1994. Sovereignty in all or part of the West Bank and East Jerusalem could be claimed by Jordan at any time under this clause – with Israel‘s concurrence – notwithstanding Jordan’s earlier repudiation in 1988. Any renewed claim would not result in a breach of the terms of Jordan’s peace treaty with Israel.

From Israel: Blowin' in the Wind

Arlene Kushner
Arlene from Israel
February 8, 2011

The news this morning was that PA president Mahmoud Abbas has secured Jordanian citizenship, as have his entire family and several other major Fatah figures such as Ahmed Qurei, Abbas’s spokesman Nabil Abu Rudaineh and Muhammad Dahlan.

According to Khaled Abu Toameh's report on this in the JPost, application for citizenship was made by PA leaders at a time when they were urging Jordan not to grant Jordanian citizenship to Palestinian Arabs so that they might "consolidate their Palestinian identity."

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In point of fact, in the last few years Jordan has done more than stop issuing Palestinian Arabs Jordanian citizenship: it has revoked the Jordanian citizenship of thousands, if not tens of thousands, of Palestinian Arabs living in the country. (Which has raised all sorts of human rights and legal issues.) King Abdullah II, a Hashemite, sits uneasy on his throne, and fears the demographic threat of a growing Palestinian population within his kingdom.

In addition, Abdullah may have sought to disassociate Jordan from the Palestinian Arabs in the face of peace proposals that link PA areas of Judea and Samaria with Jordan. This would be the flip side of the Palestinian Arab leaders' claim that their identity must be "consolidated."

But even in the face of this state of affairs, Jordanian officials felt it would be discourteous to deny the requests of top PA/Fatah members for citizenship in their country.

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This news -- disclosed yesterday by a "top Jordanian official" -- exposes the (not surprising) hypocrisy of the Fatah/PA leaders.

There is the temptation to somehow link this appeal for citizenship to current unrest in the Middle East -- i.e., Fatah heavyweights making sure they would have a place to run to, should there be an uprising inspired in the PA areas. But there was no information provided on when they secured their citizenship, and very likely it all happened well before the current situation.

Even more so, then, does this news highlight the unease of these individuals with regard to what might be coming down the road. I have written several times about Abbas's fear of entering certain areas within the PA -- notably so-called refugee camps. This matter simply shines a light on the tenuous status of the man with whom we are supposed to negotiate peace.

I won't speculate as to the motivation of the Jordanian official who decided to reveal this information right now. But what I can say is that his revelation is likely to make Abbas's position even more shaky than it already was. An editorial in Al Quds Al-Arabi called this situation "shameful": “If they don’t believe in their own [Palestinian] citizenship and are not proud of it, this means that they are not loyal to the Palestinian Authority and don’t deserve to speak on its behalf.”

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Who knows when Abbas may decide it's time to take off.

Yesterday, the Dutch Foreign Minister, Uriel (Uri) Rosenthal, visiting here, made the statement that a unilateral declaration of a state by the PA "does not do any good whatsoever." The recognition of such a state by some Latin American countries "doesn't help at all to bring the Middle East process to a higher level," he said

He stated that he has not heard anything within the EU framework regarding such recognition, observing that "We have to be very prudent and careful about what we are doing."

This is not going the way Abbas and company imagined it would, is it? I have the sense (is it wishful thinking?) that just a tad, the PA has lost some of its appeal.

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The Future of Jordan

Khaled Abu Toameh
Hudson New York
08 February '11

http://www.hudson-ny.org/1870/future-of-jordan

Jordan's King Abdullah II has good reason to be worried about the future of the monarchy in the Hashemite Kingdom. If he fails to implement real political and economic reforms, Jordan could easily fall into the hands of the Muslim Brotherhood group or turn into a Palestinian state.

Last week, in an attempt to contain public anger, the king, in a wise move, sacked the government of Prime Minister Samir Rifai. But the king's choice for a new prime minister, Marouf al-Bakhit, has not been equally wise.

Al-Bakhit, a former prime minister and ambassador to Israel, does not seem to be accepted by most of the Jordanian opposition parties, including Muslim Brotherhood.

Even more troubling for the monarch is the fact that many of the kingdom's tribes, which make up nearly 40% of the population, do not see the appointment of the new prime minister as a step in the right direction. I is hard to see how the king would be able to survive without the support of these tribes, which have long been supportive of the royal family in Amman.

In an unprecedented move, leaders of several Jordanian tribes this week issued a strong warning that the kingdom could plunge into anarchy if the king did not move quickly to combat financial and administrative corruption.

"The Tunisian and Egyptian hurricane will come to Jordan, sooner or later," said a statement signed by 36 tribe leaders. "We express regret over the fact that the regime has surrounded itself with a group of corrupt commercial partners. Jordan is suffering from a regime and government crisis, as well as a crisis of corruption."

The statement is seen a huge challenge to King Abdullah II: these tribes have always been known for their blind and unwavering devotion to the royal family. Some Jordanians fear that radical Muslims have managed to "infiltrate" many tribes, inciting them against the monarch and turning them into a tool in the hands of the Muslim Brotherhood.

But the tribes' discontent with the monarchy is not the only challenge. The king also needs to be worried about the "Palestinian problem" in his kingdom.

Millions of Palestinians living in the kingdom also pose a threat to the king. Many of these Palestinians live in harsh and inhumane conditions in refugee camps on the outskirts of the Jordanian capital of Amman.

Poverty and deprivation have driven many of these Palestinians into the open arms of Hamas and Muslim Brotherhood – two groups that would like to see an Islamic "caliphate" replace the royal family.

If the Palestinians revolt and bring down the monarchy, Jordan could become a Palestinian state. The Palestinians, under such circumstances, would end up with three states: one in the West Bank, a second in the Gaza Strip and a third in Jordan.

King Abdullah II needs to wake up before it is too late.

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Jordan, Dr. Peace and Mr. Apartheid

The world must tell Jordan that peace and integration of its own Palestinians are not privileges it is giving away.


Mudar Zahran
Op-Ed/JPost
24 July '10

Last January, Faisal al-Fayez, a Jordanian senator and former prime minister, threatened Israel on national Jordanian television with “6 million Jordanian suicide bombers.” Fayez is considered one of the closest Jordanian officials to King Abdullah II; he is also a leader of the Bani Sakher tribe which has historically dominated the most important positions in the Hashemite kingdom.

Another member of the tribe, Deputy Prime Minister and Interior Minister Nayef al-Qadi, defended an official policy of stripping Jordanians of Palestinian heritage of their citizenship, a policy that has resulted in the denaturalization of more than 2,700 so far according to a recent report by Human Rights Watch. In an interview with a London-based Arab newspaper, Qadi said that “Jordan should be thanked for standing up against Israeli ambitions of unloading of the Palestinian land of its people” which he described as “the secret Israeli aim to impose a solution of Palestinian refugees at the expense of Jordan.”

Furthermore, King Abdullah, in a clear gesture of carelessness to Israel, has extended his condolences to the family and followers of Muhammad Hussein Fadallah, Hizbullah’s spiritual leader who passed away recently.

THE CAUSES of Jordan’s recent line of official hostility toward Israel are deep-rooted in the makeup of the Jordanian state itself. Jordan is a country with a Palestinian majority which allows them little or no involvement in any political or executive bodies or parliament.

This lack of political and legislative representation of Jordanians of Palestinian heritage has been enforced by decades of systematic exclusion in all aspects of life expanding into their disenfranchisement in education, employment, housing, state benefits and even business potential, all developing into an existing apartheid no different than that formerly adopted in South Africa, except for the official acknowledgement of it.

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J Street's Shadow State Department Pushes Obama Agenda

Parrhesia
J Street Jive
03 May '10

Having recently stripped thousands of Palestinian Arabs of their Jordanian citizenship, the Hashemite Kingdom warmly welcomed J Street to its pleasure palace last week. In a display of cognitive hypocrisy, routinely practiced by J Street and the Obama administration, King Abdullah (not even shadow of his father, the erstwhile friend to Israel, King Hussein) blurted out the boiler plate demands for Palestinian "rights" (not in Jordan, of course) and statehood. Joining in the chorus, J Street officials, no doubt blessed by their leader, Obama, somehow neglected to point out the mistreatment of Palestinians east of the Jordan.

Abuse of Palestinian Arabs has not been the sole activity of Jordanians, however. Some of the Great Expellers have included Kuwait (1991 - 400,000 along with hundreds of murdered Palestinians) and Libya (1998 - over a thousand were left to languish in refugee camps along the Egyptian border).

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