Follow along with the video below to see how to install our site as a web app on your home screen.
Note: This feature currently requires accessing the site using the built-in Safari browser.
Iraq, Jordan Pull Envoys From Countries
5 minutes ago Middle East - AP
By RAWYA RAGEH, Associated Press Writer
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraq (news - web sites) and Jordan engaged in a tit-for-tat withdrawal of ambassadors Sunday in a growing dispute over Shiite Muslim claims that Jordan is failing to block terrorists from entering Iraq, while U.S. forces killed 24 insurgents in a clash south of Baghdad.
An American convoy was traveling through the Salman Pak area, 20 miles southeast of Baghdad, when it was attacked, U.S. officials said. Six soldiers and seven militants were wounded.
Sunday's diplomatic row erupted even as a Jordanian court sentenced in absentia Iraq's most feared terrorist who was born in Jordan to a 15-year prison term.
As news emerged of the largely symbolic sentencing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, whose whereabouts are unknown, his al-Qaida in Iraq organization claimed responsibility for a suicide bombing that killed a top anti-corruption official in northern Mosul. Al-Zarqawi already has been sentenced to death twice by Jordan.
Sunday's events capped a week of rising tensions that included a protest in which Shiite demonstrators raised the Iraqi flag over the Jordanian embassy in Baghdad and claims by the Shiite clergy-backed United Iraqi Alliance that Jordan was allowing terrorists to slip into Iraq.
"Iraqis are feeling very bitter over what happened. We decided, as the Iraqi government, to recall the Iraqi ambassador from Amman to discuss this," Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari told The Associated Press.
Jordan acted first, when Foreign Minister Hani al-Mulqi announced his charge d'affaires in Baghdad had been recalled to Amman.
"We are hoping that the Iraqi police will devise a plan to protect the embassy," al-Mulqi said. "Meanwhile, we have asked the charge d'affaires to come back because he was living in the embassy."
He added that other Jordanian diplomats will remain in Baghdad because they do not live in the embassy compound.
Both countries said the officials were being recalled for "consultations," leaving open the possibility for their return.
Shiites began holding protests after the Iraqi government on Monday condemned celebrations allegedly held by the family of a Jordanian man suspected of carrying out a Feb. 28 terrorist attack that killed 125 people in Hillah, 60 miles south of Baghdad. Nearly all the victims were Shiite police and army recruits.
The Jordanian daily Al-Ghad reported that Raed Mansour al-Banna carried out the attack, the single deadliest of the Iraqi insurgency. The newspaper later issued a correction, however, saying it was not known where al-Banna carried out an assault.
Al-Banna's family has denied his involvement in the Hillah attack, saying al-Banna carried out a different suicide bombing in Iraq, and Al-Zarqawi's group claimed responsibility for the Hillah bombing.
A military court sentenced al-Zarqawi to 15 years in jail and imprisoned an associate for three years for planning an attack on the Jordanian Embassy, the offices of the Jordanian military attache, and unspecified American targets, all in Iraq.
The two Jordanians allegedly met in Iraq in November 2003 to plan an assault on the embassy after an August bombing of the same building killed 18 people. Al-Zarqawi has also been accused in the August attack.
The United States has issued a $25 million reward for al-Zarqawi, who was previously sentenced to death twice in Jordan: once for the Oct. 28, 2002, killing of U.S. diplomat Laurence Foley, and again for planning to attack U.S. and Israeli targets during 1999 New Year's celebrations in the kingdom.
Also Sunday, in Iraq's north, a suicide bomber blew himself up inside a government compound in Mosul, killing himself and Walid Kashmoula, the head of the Iraqi police anti-corruption department, officials said. Three others were injured. Al-Qaida in Iraq claimed responsibility for the attack.
"The renegade Walid Kashmoula has been assassinated by a martyrdom operation, thanks to God, and he is the No. 1 American agent in Mosul," Abu Maysara al-Iraqi, the group's designated "media coordinator," purportedly said in a message posted on an extremist Islamic Web site.
In other violence Sunday...:
3/20/2005
Iraq versus Jordan: MidEast Pains, Coalition Political Gains
Filed under: General site admin @ 2:38 pm
Iraq and Jordan have recalled their ambassadors (Reuters). Iraqi protests at the Jordanian embassy are the immediate reason but the deep reason is Abu Musab al- Zarqawi and his Al Qaeda terrorists. Last month a Jordanian terrorist killed himself and 125 Iraqis in the February 28th bloodbath at Hilla. When Jordanians from a the terrorists home-town called the killer a martyr, Iraqis erupted.
Reuters:
Iraqi protesters have burned Jordanian flags and broken into the heavily-guarded embassy at least twice since the suicide bombing in Hilla on Feb. 28. They held banners reading no to terrorism and called on Arabs to speak out against praise of suicide bombers.
As the Reuters report notes, both the Jordanian government and the alledged terrorists family deny the man committed the crime.
However, But, Yet no one debates Zarqawis nationality. Iraqis are sick and tired of Zarqawis and Al Qaedas murder and destruction and they want other Arab Muslim countries to take strong action. This hatred for Zarqawi isnt a new phenomenon I heard similar comments last summer in Baghdad. Now after the Iraqi elections the Iraqi people feel confident enough to demonstrate in the streets. That means they attract cameras even Al Jazeerahs.
The demonstrations are another huge political defeat for Al Qaeda. The demonstrations make the point that Al Qaeda kills Arabs, Al Qaeda kills Muslims. Washington fretted -and quite correctly that the coalition was losing the information war. Since January 30th, the Iraqis have been winning that war.
Will Jordan crack down? The Jordanian government is no friend of Al Qaeda. What the Iraqi pressure does, however, is put pressure on Jordanian imams and Al Qaeda sympathizers. Hey, its not New York you attacked, its Hilla. A free, stable Iraq will ignite an economic boom in Jordan, and the Jordanian business community knows this. The last thing the Jordanian government and business establishmentwant to do is anger and alienate the Iraqi electorate. (Yes, electorate no longer simple the Iraqi people, but the Iraqi electorate.)
See this post for a personal statement by a member of the Iraqi electorate, Husayn Uthman. Will The Nation and The Guardian publish it? Okay, Ill settle for The New York Times.
