AMMAN: Jordan’s army said it foiled a plot on Monday by dozens of infiltrators from Syria linked to pro-Iranian militias, who crossed its border with rocket launchers, anti-personnel mines and explosives.
State broadcaster Al-Mamlaka said the army blew up a vehicle laden with explosives as it resisted the biggest armed cross border operation to smuggle weapons and drugs in recent years.
The army earlier said the infiltrators had fled back across the border after injuring several army personnel in latest of several major incursions since the start of the month that has left one Jordanian soldier and at least a dozen smugglers dead.
Jordanian officials, like their Western allies, say that Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah group and militias who control much of southern Syria were behind a surge in drug and weapons smuggling.
“Jordan knows the country that stands behind this. It’s Iran that is sponsoring these militias. These are hostile military actions against Jordan on its territory,” said Samih Maayteh, a former minister briefed by officials on developments.
Iran and Hezbollah say the allegations are part of Western plots against the country. Syria denies complicity with Iranian-backed militias linked to its army and security forces.
UN experts and US and European officials say the illicit drug trade finances a proliferation of pro-Iranian militias and pro-government paramilitary forces created by more than a decade of conflict in Syria.
War-torn Syria has become the region’s main site for a multi-billion-dollar drug trade, with Jordan being a key transit route to the oil-rich Gulf states for a Syrian-made amphetamine known as captagon, Western anti-narcotics officials and Washington say.
The army said it would “continue to track these armed groups and prevent any attempt to undermine the kingdom’s national security.”
“The last few days have seen a spike in these operations that are changing from infiltration attempts and smuggling to armed clashes with the goal of crossing the border by force and targeting border guards,” the army statement added.
Jordan’s Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi last week told Iran’s Foreign Minister Hossien Amirabdollahian during a meeting in Geneva that Tehran should do more to rein in militias it finances that are active along the Syrian-Jordanian border, officials say.
They say the Jordanian army was considering conducting pre-emptive strikes inside Syria against those militias linked to the drug trade and their facilities in a bid to stem what they say is an alarming rise in cross-border incursions.
Jordan says it foiled plot against its security by Iran-linked smugglers from Syria
https://arab.news/bgzuy
Jordan says it foiled plot against its security by Iran-linked smugglers from Syria
- State broadcaster said army blew up a vehicle laden with explosives as it resisted the biggest armed cross border operation to smuggle weapons and drugs in recent years
Family of Palestinian-American shot dead by Israeli settler demand accountability
- Relatives say Abu Siyam was among about 30 residents from the village of Mukhmas who confronted armed settlers attempting to steal goats from the community
LONDON: The family of a 19-year-old Palestinian-American man reportedly shot dead by an Israeli settler in the occupied West Bank have demanded accountability, amid mounting scrutiny over a surge in settler violence and a lack of prosecutions.
Nasrallah Abu Siyam, a US citizen born in Philadelphia, was killed near the city of Ramallah on Wednesday, becoming at least the sixth American citizen to die in incidents involving Israeli settlers or soldiers in the territory in the past two years.
Relatives say Abu Siyam was among about 30 residents from the village of Mukhmas who confronted armed settlers attempting to steal goats from the community. Witnesses said that stones were thrown by both sides before settlers opened fire, wounding at least three villagers.
Abu Siyam was struck and later died of his injuries.
Abdulhamid Siyam, the victim’s cousin, said the killing reflected a wider pattern of impunity.
“A young man of 19 shot and killed in cold blood, and no responsibility,” he told the BBC. “Impunity completely.”
The US State Department said that it was aware of the death of a US citizen and was “carefully monitoring the situation,” while the Trump administration said that it stood ready to provide consular assistance.
The Israeli embassy in Washington said the incident was under review and that an operational inquiry “must be completed as soon as possible.”
A spokesperson for the Israeli Defense Forces said troops were deployed to the scene and used “riot dispersal means to restore order,” adding that no IDF gunfire was reported.
The military confirmed that the incident remained under review and said that a continued presence would be maintained in the area to prevent further unrest.
Palestinians and human rights organizations say such reviews rarely lead to criminal accountability, arguing that Israeli authorities routinely fail to prosecute settlers accused of violence.
A US embassy spokesperson later said that Washington “condemns this violence,” as international concern continues to grow over conditions in the occupied West Bank.
Palestinians and human rights groups say Israeli authorities routinely fail to investigate or prosecute settlers accused of violence against civilians.
Those concerns were echoed this week by the UN, which warned that Israel’s actions in the occupied West Bank may amount to ethnic cleansing.
A UN human rights office report on Thursday said that Israeli settlement expansion, settler attacks and military operations have increasingly displaced Palestinian communities, with dozens of villages reportedly emptied since the start of the Gaza war.
The report also criticized Israeli military tactics in the northern West Bank, saying that they resembled warfare and led to mass displacement, while noting abuses by Palestinian security forces, including the use of unnecessary lethal force and the intimidation of critics.
Neither Israel’s foreign ministry nor the Palestinian Authority has commented on the findings.
