For the sixth day in a row, thousands of demonstrators march in front of the Israeli embassy in the capital city of Amman. Many of them are waving Palestinian flags and shouting, “They said Hamas is terrorist.” Jordan as a whole is Hamas.”
In the fifth day of widespread demonstrations against Israel, thousands of Jordanians gathered in front of the Israeli embassy, demanding an end to the unpopular peace deal between Jordan and its Zionist neighbor to the west.
On Thursday, demonstrators in Amman’s wealthy Rabieh neighborhood held Palestinian flags and shouted, “They said Hamas is terrorist.” Jordan as a whole is Hamas.”
Protesters also chanted, “No Zionist embassy on Jordanian land,” calling for the government to shut down the embassy and revoke the 1994 peace agreement that restored diplomatic relations with Israel.
Posters reading “Amman-Gaza one destiny” were displayed alongside images of Abu Obaida, the masked military spokesman for Hamas who has gained widespread fame in the Arab world.
Protesters have congregated at the Israeli embassy for five days in a row. The Israeli embassy has historically served as a hotspot when tensions between Israel and the Palestinians have erupted.
disobeyed police directives
In contrast to earlier this week, when riot police used tear gas and hit protestors with batons to stop them from storming the embassy, heavy security on Thursday was intended to reduce the number of demonstrators, and the march proceeded peacefully.
However, hundreds of protesters refused to leave despite police instructions to do so, stating they would stay on the streets until the wee hours of Friday morning.
Over the course of a months-long campaign, Jordanian authorities have increased the number of demonstrators they have arrested. Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International have denounced the campaign as a restriction on the right to free speech.
Jordanians, a major portion of whom are of Palestinian descent, are extremely enraged about Israel’s ceaseless bombardment of Gaza, which has resulted in tens of thousands of civilian deaths and the destruction of a sizable portion of the heavily populated territory.
Some of the most public outbursts of fury in the area since the war have occurred in Jordan.
A significant portion of the populace opposes Jordan’s peace pact with Israel because they believe that normalization will violate the rights of their Palestinian neighbors.
SOURCE: TRTWORLD
