Fear Uncertainty and Doubt at the State Department

Malki z"l

Words cannot convey the enormity of a 20th anniversary of the massacre that took our child's life. 

Instead I'll take this opportunity to focus on the ongoing travesty of justice which we are endeavoring to correct. And rather than restate it in detail, I'll home in on the U.S. State Department's current stance.

That Department has concocted its very own, as yet unheard-of, definition of "prioritize". In its curt official response to our email enquiring whether Secretary of State Blinken mentioned Ahlam Tamimi to King Abdullah last week, that verb popped up repeatedly.

Secretary Blinken met privately with King Abdullah of Jordan following President Biden's tete-a-tete with Jordan's unelected ruler. My husband and I wondered whether Blinken raised the matter of Jordan's refusal to accede to the U.S. Department of Justice's demand that our child's murderer, Hamas operative Tamimi, be extradited to be tried in a U.S. Federal Court for the orchestration of of the 2001 Sbarro bombing - the terror attack in which 15 men, women and children perished - and a sixteenth has been in a coma ever since. 

Three of those victims, including our fifteen year old Malki, were U.S. citizens. (Malki and a young American tourist are the two dead American nationals. The third American is alive but has been in a vegetative coma all these years.) 

Moreover, in 1995 Jordan and the U.S. signed and ratified an extradition treaty.

Sec Blinken hosts Jordan's king - July 20, 2021 

So "prioritizing" the issue would have made a lot of sense. The official message below sent to us a few days ago as a private email would truly have been a welcome one: 

"I want to express the Department's sincere condolences on the tragic loss of your daughter, Malki, murdered in the heinous attack in Jerusalem in 2001. As the [exact job title deleted, at least for now] for Counterterrorism, I want to reiterate to you and your family that the Department of State continues to prioritize seeing Ahlam al-Tamimi face justice in the United States for her role in the terrorist attack that claimed the life of your daughter and 14 others. We continue to seek Tamimi's extradition to the United States at the most senior levels with the Government of Jordan."

It would indeed have been welcome had it been at all truthful. 

But clearly in the State Department lexicon, "prioritize" means something entirely different from what it does for you and me. 

Because this is how Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken actually handled the king's intransigence during his encounter with him...

Though he would presumably be considered an official at the "most senior levels" of his own department, it appears he simply did not raise it at all. 

Instead, like every other American official, politician or VIP who met with him during his July 19-23 Washington visit, he occupied himself with lavishing praise on King Abdullah.

Here are Blinken's words to the press prior to their private conversation. Don't be shocked at the hyperbolic royalty rigmarole - it is de rigeur when any U.S. official or journalist addresses that dictator:

"...Your Majesty, it is a real pleasure to welcome you to the State Department, the Crown Prince as well. We couldn’t be more pleased to have you here. .. I think it’s a reflection of the tremendous value that the United States places on its relationship with Jordan, a remarkable partnership over many years, many decades. Jordan is a powerful, powerful partner for peace, for stability in the region, dealing with ISIS and terrorism, a remarkably generous host to refugees. On so many levels, this partnership demonstrates its importance, its value to us... So, we’re so pleased to have you here... Lots to talk about, but mostly, welcome. Welcome to you, Crown Prince, welcome. It’s so good to have you as well." [Official remarks to the press according to the State Department record, July 20, 2021]

And in case that introduction left anyone in doubt, the exchange below between a journalist and a State Department spokesman at the subsequent press conference should put the matter to rest:

QUESTION: Yeah. Well, did it [the Tamimi extradition issue] come up?
MR PRICE: I’m not in a position to speak to the meeting, but we’ll have a readout...
QUESTION: Well, are you – I mean, are you – has this administration yet raised it with – raised the matter with Jordanian authorities, the King or not? Or is this something that would have just come up for the first time today?
MR PRICE: This issue has been raised with our Jordanian partners.

[Official State Department Press Briefing, July 20, 2021] 

I don't know about you but I would conclude that the spokesperson is really saying it wasn't raised but he prefers to not say that explicitly.

Stay tuned for my next post where I detail former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's dismissal of our entreaties. The State Department's adoration of Jordan's king is as bi-partisan as bi-partisan gets.

[Wondering what the term "Fear Uncertainty and Doubt" means? See this here.]

On failing to move our fight for justice to center-stage

King Abdullah II of Jordan addresses a Congressional committee

As Malki's yahrzeit nears (the twentieth day of the month of Av in the Hebrew calendar which this year falls on July 29, two days from now), we are digesting the failure of last week's efforts to bring our fight for justice to center-stage.

Despite some of our terrific media exposure, Jordan's King Abdullah scored his customary adulation - groveling, actually - from his US hosts. They included the White House, Congress and major media outlets. And that was across-the-board, bi-partisan groveling.

The king's last interview (actually the only interview he appears to have given to the American media throughout his entire lengthy visit (text here via Jordan Times; video here via CNN), was with CNN's Fareed Zakaria who rates by most, myself included, as level-headed, intelligent and insightful. 

So I was surprised and disgusted to watch him behave as sycophantically as every other American has in Abdullah's presence. Each sentence was preceded with "Your Highness" (he used the expression seven times). And his last line was "Your Highness, it always an honor and a pleasure to talk to you."

I invite anyone to explain to me why champions of democracy are so obsequious to a ruthless, unelected totalitarian dictator; a leader who protects a self-confessed mass-murdering terrorist and refuses to extradite her to the US despite its demand that he do so in accordance with a valid extradition treaty signed and ratified 26 years ago.

Mr. Zakariah, please explain why you studiously avoided this issue in your lengthy interview - "wide-ranging" was how the Jordanian press described it. 

Source: FBI website

Explain why the fact that Abdullah harbors one of the FBI's Most Wanted Terrorists didn't detract one iota from the respect you lavished on him. 

How has he captivated you? With his impeccable mastery of the English language? His almost-British accent? His glibness? His beautiful, designer clad, and equally articulate, wife?

But Zakaria is in good company. Neither President Biden nor Secretary of State Blinken mentioned the Tamimi travesty of justice either when they met with Abdullah this past week. Since videos of those conversations weren't released, we have no way of knowing whether they were also as sycophantic as Zakaria toward a ruler, don't forget, who is recipient of US$1.6 billion in aid annually.

This king-worship - a monarch who remains in power by the grace of US benefaction - is as baffling as it is infuriating.