Tail wags dog: How does Jordan keep getting away with it?

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While we note our Malki's departure from this world on the 20th day of the Hebrew month of Av which this year falls on Wednesday, August 17, 2022, we mark today - August 9 - as the secular anniversary of the Sbarro bombing in which she perished.

 
It has also become the day when Arnold and I note the injustice with which we are grappling: Ahlam Tamimi, the Hamas operative responsible for the Sbarro massacre that snuffed out 15 precious Jewish lives remains... free!

She publicly boasts of her guilt or, to quote her, of "my operation". She has been indicted by the United States Department of Justice. Her extradition from Jordan, her home and refuge, has been demanded by the US under a valid 1995 extradition treaty with Jordan. She is an FBI Most Wanted Terrorist and has a $5 million reward posted for her capture.

 
Yet despite the open-and-shut nature of this case, Arnold and I find it near impossible to win the support of influencers: neither Democrats nor Republicans, neither Jews nor non-Jews, neither Americans nor Israelis. 

All are caught in the thrall of Jordan's dictator, a.k.a. King Abdullah II, whose impoverished regime refuses to extradite this monster.

 
A minor player on the global geo-political stage, under constant internal threat, hanging on to power by his fingernails and by repression ("Jordan is unfree"), Abdullah enjoys massive cash support and unadulterated reverence from all.

 
Why? 

Why is this tail able to wag the dog incessantly? Why does everyone we encounter sing his praises?

Of course, there is no shortage of lame excuses fed to us for this travesty of justice. But the truth remains elusive.

So, on this anniversary of the Sbarro massacre please join us in our grief and fury and ponder what can be done to right this egregious wrong.

On making terrorists pay the price and other questions for the President

The Jordanian royals on the day they were hosted in the Oval Office

We're in the hours leading up to Rosh Hashana, the start of the High Holydays season in Jewish life and the start of a new year according to the lunar calendar of the Jewish people.

It's an appropriate time to mention what President Biden expressed in the wake of the August 26, 2021 atrocity carried out at Kabul's airport in Afghanistan. 

Speaking after what he called “a tough day”, he said the United States would uphold its “sacred obligation” to the families of the fallen. Quoted in the New York Times, President Biden sounded unequivocally determined:

“To those who carried out this attack, as well as anyone who wishes America harm, know this: We will not forgive,” the president said. “We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay.” ...He vowed the United States would respond with force at “a moment of our choosing,” echoing President Bush’s remarks days after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

President Biden, here's what I am wondering. Why isn't the mass-murdering terrorist Ahlam Tamimi, the one whose bomb took the life of fifteen innocents inside a pizzeria including my sweet daughter Malki, being made to "pay the price". 

Seven men and women and eight children perished in Tamimi's 2001 attack on Jerusalem's Sbarro pizzeria. Two of her victims were Americans including Malki who was just fifteen.

Bringing Tamimi to justice ought to be surprisingly straightforward. There is no need to "hunt her down" in your words; her whereabouts are known to all, or at least everyone who needs to know which includes the law enforcement agencies of the United States government. 

But here's the thing. Tamimi, who has never denied what she did, lives as a protected celebrity in Amman, Jordan's capital city. To judge from the number of media interviews she has given, her precise home address is a matter of public knowledge. 

And it gets even easier: there is an extradition treaty that was signed and ratified by the US and Jordan in 1995 and that is regarded as valid by the State Department. 

What's more, her extradition to stand trial in the US has already been demanded over and again by the Department of Justice, starting - according to well-placed sources - in 2013, more than eight years ago.

Eight years. 

So you and anyone reading this may ask why it is that Tamimi hasn't already been made to "pay the price"? Why is she still free, influential, a Jordanian icon?

And here too the answer is not complicated. It is because the White House and the State Department are afraid to upset Jordan's King Abdullah. They have accepted his refusal to comply with their extradition demand without the slightest whimper. 

King Abdullah, the unelected ruler of a small, impoverished country which has received billions of dollars in US aid for years, gets to dictate the rules: No extradition. 

And you, Mr President - who talks so tough to the Kabul airport terrorists - have no tough words for King Abdullah. Only reverence for "His Majesty". 

And, of course, more cash.

Help for our cause from the Washington Post

This may not be an op ed as my husband and I had in yesterday's Wall Street Journal. But it is nonetheless an achievement.

In my assessment, this exposure has nudged Jordan's outrageous behavior a bit closer to the headlines. And we owe a huge debt of gratitude to AP journalist Aamer Madhani who inserted the Tamimi scandal into his coverage of the Abdullah-Biden tete a tete. 

He did that despite the absence of any indication that the leaders discussed it at all. In fact, he devoted a full third of his brief article to our struggle.

So, without further ado, here is today's tiny triumph as it appeared in the Washington Post and in dozens of other syndication clients of Associated Press:

Biden calls Jordan king a loyal ally in ‘tough neighborhood’

by: AAMER MADHANI, Associated Press | Posted July 19, 2021 

FILE – In this May 26, 2021 file photo, Jordan’s King Abdullah II listens during a meeting with Secretary of State Antony Blinken, in Amman, Jordan. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, Pool, File)

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden praised King Abdullah II of Jordan as a stalwart ally in a “tough neighborhood” as the two leaders huddled at the White House on Monday, a meeting that came at a pivotal moment for both leaders in the Middle East.

Last week a Jordanian state security court sentenced two former officials to 15 years in prison over an alleged plot against the king uncovered earlier this year that involved Abdullah’s half-brother.

Meanwhile, Biden, who has put much of his foreign policy focus on China and Russia in the early going, faces some difficult issues in the Middle East. He is dealing with stepped-up attacks against U.S. troops in Iraq and Syria by Iranian-backed militias at the same moment that his administration is trying to nudge Iran back to the negotiating table to revive the nuclear agreement that Donald Trump abandoned during his presidency.

“You have always been there, and we will always be there for Jordan,” Biden said during an Oval Office meeting with Abdullah and his son, the Crown Prince Hussein.

Abdullah had a difficult relationship with Trump, who he saw as undercutting any chance for a peace deal between Israelis and Palestinians with his 2017 declaration of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. He also chaffed at the Trump administration’s pursuit of what officials called the Abraham Accords — deals with Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Sudan and Morocco that normalized relations with Israel but left out the Palestinians.

Biden has no plans to reverse U.S. recognition of Jerusalem as the capital. His administration has even praised the Trump-brokered accords — a rare instance of the Democratic administration speaking positively of the former administration.

Biden planned to stress to Abdullah in private that the accords are not an “end run” on finding the way to a peace deal that includes a Palestinian state, according to a senior administration official who was not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.

Abdullah, for his part, praised Biden for “setting the standard” internationally in the battle against COVID-19. The U.S. delivered 500,000 vaccines to Jordan days ahead of the king’s visit. The king also appeared to make clear that he was looking to reset the U.S. – Jordan relationship after a four bumpy years with Trump.

“You can always count on me, my country, and many of our colleagues in the region,” Abdullah said.

The two leaders discussed the situation in Syria — more than 1 million Syrian refugees have fled the war-ravaged nation for Jordan — and a wobbly security situation in Iraq, an administration official said. At least eight drone attacks have targeted the U.S. military presence in Iraq since Biden took office in January, as well as 17 rocket attacks.

Abdullah is set to have a working breakfast Tuesday with Vice President Kamala Harris and to meet with Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

The meeting with Biden was also a chance for the king to spotlight his closeness to Biden following the attempted coup.

Bassem Awadallah, who has U.S. citizenship and once served as a top aide to King Abdullah II, and Sharif Hassan bin Zaid, a member of the royal family, were found guilty of sedition and incitement charges. Both men denied the charges and Awadallah’s U.S. lawyer said his client alleged he was tortured in Jordanian detention and fears for his life.

They are alleged to have conspired with Prince Hamzah, the king’s half-brother. Biden, who has known Abdullah for years, was quick to publicly express “strong U.S. support for Jordan” and praise the king’s leadership after details of the coup attempt were unveiled in April.

It’s unclear if Biden raised the United States’ long-standing call to extradite Ahlam Ahmad al-Tamimi, a Palestinian woman living in Jordan who is wanted by the U.S. on a charge of conspiring to use a weapon of mass destruction against American nationals.

The Trump administration last year indicated it was considering withholding aidto Jordan in a bid to secure al-Tamimi’s extradition. She was convicted in Israel of a 2001 bombing of a Tel Aviv restaurant that killed 15 people, including two American citizens. She has lived freely in Jordan since she was released in a Hamas-Israel prisoner swap in 2011.

Biden administration officials have previously made clear to Jordan that the extradition of al-Tamimi, who is on the FBI’s most wanted list, is of “high-interest” to the United States, according to the administration official.

Arnold Roth, whose 15-year-old daughter, Malki, was killed in the bombing, noted that Biden has spoken frequently of “decency” and “dignity” as paramount values in how he’ll run his administration. Roth and his wife, Frimet, wrote Blinken and other administration officials last month calling on the administration to press Abdullah for extradition. He said they received no response from the administration beyond acknowledgement that their letter was received.

“I can’t think of two words that more powerfully encapsulate what we’ve been deprived of in all of our dealings with the U.S. government,” Roth said.

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