Revering a master of delusion

[Source: Jordan Times, September 18, 2017]

This post is triggered by developments announced a few days ago. See "AJC calls on Justice Department to pursue Ahlam Tamimi extradition" [Jewish Insider, July 13, 2023]. The call by one of America's most important Jewish organizations is a significant event.

The Jordanian dictator - otherwise known as King Abdullah II - is a master of delusion.

His victims include the entire spectrum of American influencers: politicians, journalists, Democrats, Republicans, Jews, non-Jews. All revere and praise him as a progressive leader.

But for me it is the leaders of major American Jewish organizations whose reverence is the most repugnant.

It impedes their interest in fighting for justice for the three Jewish Americans murdered in the 2001 Sbarro terror bombing in Jerusalem spearheaded by Hamas operative and Jordanian citizen, Ahlam Tamimi. 

The charges against her were initially signed off in a US Federal court ten years ago this week. But they were kept sealed and secret at that time. 

They became public much later, on March 14, 2017. Here's the official Department of Justice announcement: "Individual Charged in Connection With 2001 Terrorist Attack in Jerusalem That Resulted in Death of Americans"

Among the sixteen victims was my daughter Malki, 15. She was just one of eight Jewish children targeted by Tamimi and her bomb. Though Tamimi, as the AJC's letter last week explains, faces terror charges in Washington, she is kept safe by the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan.

[Source: Jordan Times, February 3, 2023]

Despite this, key executives of numerous major American Jewish organizations continue to meet formally with Jordan's ruler. 

Two photos - one at the top of this post and another on the right - are among many my husband and I have found online via Arab sources - showing the meetings they frequently attend (annually and sometimes more often than that) at King Abdullah's invitation.

With one or two exceptions, they do so without ever publicly demanding that Tamimi, whom Abdullah harbors, is extradicted to Washington despite her indictment by the United States. The extradition treaty, signed and ratified by Abdullah's father in 1995, and in effect from then onwards, doesn't move him one iota.

Nor does it move any of those influential Jewish leaders.

They are all under the spell of the "king's" stardust.

Shame on them all.

Don't we deserve better than this lamentable leadership?

A Jordanian news report from 2017 includes this photo of

American Jewish leaders meeting with King Abdullah II.
The report quotes the king, but not the Jews.

Et tu Brute?

Those words are uttered at a dramatic juncture in Shakespeare's Julius Caesar by the dying emperor at the moment he is assasssinated by his friend Marcus Junius Brutus.

They come to mind whenever I learn of a recent and deplorable Jewish practice that directly impacts on me in personal and unspeakably painful ways.

Here's how Jewish Insider reported a Washington gathering on February 2, 2023:

King Abdullah II of Jordan met with Jewish leaders in Washington, D.C., yesterday. Those in attendance included Rabbi Marc Schneier, Ted Deutch, Jeremy Ben-Ami, Jonathan Greenblatt, Susie Gelman, Hadar Susskind, Dana Gershon, Betty Ehrenberg, Jason Isaacson, John Hannah and Harriet Schleifer.

There's a Jordanian news report [here] as well. As usual, no Jews are named or quoted.

On February 3, 2023, Jordan's Royal Hashemite Court published
and disseminated this photo to illustrate its report under the headline
"King meets representatives of international,
US Jewish organisations"

It's become an annual tradition. Eexecutives of major Jewish organizations in the US solemnly file into a meeting room in some fancy hotel or embassy hall and pay their utmost respects to the visiting ruler of Jordan. he speaks, and his words are faithfully reported in Jordan's media. 

I don't personally know most of the people in the list. And since this hasn't been reported anywhere, I don't know what they said. Or whether they spoke at all.

I do however know something about what previous groups of Jewish leaders said and didn't say when they met the Jordanian. And what they have and have not said publicly to America's top political leaders. 

My husband and I [see This Ongoing War] have been outspoken for years about the abject failures of America's Jewish leadership in the Tamimi/Jordan/justice affair.

From a quick check on the web, I see all the distinguished Jewish people meeting King Abdullah this past Thursday hold leading positions in significant organizations (listed alphabetically) that include:

• Americans for Peace Now (educating Americans about "policies that will lead to comprehensive, durable, Israeli-Palestinian and Israeli-Arab peace")
• The American Jewish Committee ("the leading global Jewish advocacy organization")
• The Anti Defamation League
• The Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations
• The Foundation for Ethnic Understanding ("to build Muslim-Jewish relations globally")
• Israel Policy Forum ("mobilize support among American Jewish leaders and U.S. policymakers for the realization of a viable two-state solution")
• J Street ("we advocate for diplomacy-first American leadership and policies that advance justice")
• The Jewish Institute for National Security of America
  
• National Council of Jewish Women ("social justice by improving the quality of life for women, children, and families and by safeguarding individual rights and freedoms")
• World Jewish Congress ("to foster the unity and represent the interests of the Jewish people")

I know I should have grown used to it. But the pain these encounters inflict only intensifies with time.

My Malki's photos speak to me every day when I am in their presence in our living room. Her gentle eyes, sweet smile, modesty and love radiate from them. Since she was murdered in the Sbarro terror bombing in the summer of 2001, it's the only way she communicates with me.

As I peruse them tonight, I am reminded afresh that Jewish leaders promoting themselves in the Jewish media and mailed solicitations as staunch advocates of rights of the Jews evidently care not one bit about her or us.

Malki's murderer, Ahlam Tamimi, indicted in Washington in 2013 (though this was kept secret until; 2017) is protected and shielded from justice by King Abdullah II of Jordan. And, whatever the leaders say, this clearly doesn't matter one iota to them.

The facts are so clear to me and, as far as I can tell, so irrelevant to them.

The fact that Jordan and the United States have had a valid and active extradition treaty since the days of the Clinton administration and the late King Hussein - the father of today's monarch. 

The fact that the U.S. Department of Justice has demanded that Jordan extradite her under it, and hand her over to the FBI's waiting arms so she can be brought to criminal trial in Washington.

The fact that King Abdullah has authorized the rejection of that demand since Tamimi's indictment. 

The fact whenever he calls, they come running, as they did last week.

It is an incomprehensible exhibition of sycophancy toward a man who is brazenly using them to buttress his position as a close ally of the U.S. And, most important, as the world's largest recipient of U.S. financial aid - now running at some $1.5 billion a year.

Jordan's disdain for Israel is apparently not a factor for Jewish leaders when deciding whether to accept the vaunted invitation of His Majesty (as they usually refer to him).

In meetings, letters and phone calls with many of those leaders we have pleaded since 2017 for their assistance in pressuring the United States to get Jordan to comply with its treaty obligation. All produced nothing more than demeaning, dismissive responses.

What a pathetic show of spinelessness.

Remember this when these organizations next solicit your donation.

On my murdered daughter's birthday, a request

Last week's terror bombings that took the life of Jerusalem teen Aryeh Schupak, and, a few days later, of Tadese Tashume Ben-Ma’ada, 50, father of six, who succumbed to his wounds on November 26, 2022, jolted the nation. 

They also stirred up the horror right beneath the surface of my soul. Horror that has lingered there since 2001, when my daughter Malki was murdered in the Jerusalem Sbarro pizzeria bombing on a hot, summer's afternoon. 

Like the twin bus-stop bombings of last week, the 10 kg bomb that destroyed Sbarro was also packed with nails to maximize the casualties it would inflict. And the Sbarro bomb's target was also a site that children, specifically, would be frequenting at that hour.

A Jerusalem bus stop, one of the two attacked on

November 23, 2022 [Image Source]

Now another innocent Jewish teen - kind, generous, earnest, industrious full of dreams and plans like our child - did not return to his parents.

When I say my heart goes out to his family, those are not just formulaic words. I really do know what they are enduring.

Malki would have celebrated her 37th birthday today, November 27, 2022, if not for that evil act of Hamas operative, Ahlam Tamimi. 

But unlike the terrorists who murdered Aryeh and Ben-Ma'ada, Ahlam Tamimi's whereabouts are known to all. She lives free and protected by Jordan's King Abdullah II. She was indicted by the United States Department of Justice in 2013. Her extradition from Jordan was subsequently demanded under a 1995 treaty signed and ratified by both countries. The U.S. has explicitly deemed that treaty valid despite Jordan's years-late insistence to the contrary.

But there the U.S.'s pursuit of justice for our Malki - a U.S. citizen - has come to a screeching halt.

The very same administration that declared on November 23, 2022, that "We condemn unequivocally the acts of terror overnight in Jerusalem. The United States has offered all appropriate assistance to the Government of Israel as it investigates the attack and works to bring the perpetrators to justice" is doing nothing, I repeat nothing, to bring the fugitive Sbarro perpetrator, Ahlam Tamimi, to justice. 

She has boasted of murdering fifteen men, women and children in the bombing she orchestrated at Sbarro but remains free as a lark.

My husband and I have been struggling since early-2012 to garner attention for our fight. The persistent silence and indifference that have met our pleas is not something we could have anticipated. It crosses all religious, political and geographic lines and is utterly confounding.

But without a doubt, the most disconcerting has been the silence and indifference of American Jewish activists, leaders, politicians and organization heads who claim to be concerned with causes precisely like ours: justice for Jewish victims. 

Many have close personal relationships with Jordan's ruler, Abdullah, often to the absurd point of adulation. His country's blatant anti-Semitism doesn't faze them.

Their hypocrisy has been a bitter pill for us to swallow.

If you too are incensed by this outrage, and are in a position to promote our cause, we are currently preparing a campaign where your help can be instrumental. Please contact us by email at thisongoingwar@gmail.com

Even if you feel you cannot take part, please do consider signing our petition addressed to the U.S. Secretary of State (you do not need to be an American to sign it): change.org/ExtraditeTamimi