Is Jordan coordinating with Israel to detain activists?

Does Jordan use security coordination with Israel in order to detect and detain activists? The similarities between those detained and how they were arrested suggests that there is indeed some cooperation between security agencies.

The Jordanian security agencies, for example, carried out a series of security sweeps recently that have so far netted 26 people, some of whom happen to be political activists; the majority are union members or university students and teachers. Some are not known to be engaged in any obvious political activities. Their detentions have prompted many people to ask questions about the reasons and timing of the arrests.

The detainees are mostly either Islamists or close to the Islamic intellectual school of the Muslim Brotherhood. What many have not remarked on is that many of them carry what are known as yellow or green cards. The latter designate them as Palestinians from the West Bank; their green cards enable them to enter Jordan for visits or study purposes. Yellow cards signify Jordanian citizens of Palestinian West Bank origin; their cards enable them to visit their relatives in the West Bank. In addition, some of the detainees are former prisoners of the Israelis who were deported to Jordan following their release many years ago.

How has all of this come to light? About three months ago, Israel’s internal intelligence agency, Shin Bet, claimed that it had arrested members of a military cell belonging to the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) in the occupied West Bank; thirty people were involved. This cell, it is claimed, was planning to carry out operations against the Israeli occupation. Among those detained were some Jordanians, who have been named as Engineer Manaf Jbarah, a member of the Jordanian Engineers Syndicate; Engineer Abdallah Al-Zitawi Al-Alami, from the same syndicate; and Muhammad Al-Shourbaji, a teacher in the Al-Ridwan Islamic Schools in Amman.

According to the information released by Shin Bet a week ago, the cell members are Hamas militants who were, it is alleged, instructed by the movement’s leadership in Turkey. Ex-prisoner Salih Al-Arouri who lives in Turkey is said to be the person giving the orders.

Maariv newspaper mentioned that a number of the cell members received military training in Jordan in 2012 prior to arriving in the West Bank at the beginning of this year. The paper also said that they met other activists and collected data about military and settler targets.

In Jordan, meanwhile, twenty-six people have been detained by the security agencies in recent months; they are known as “the political prisoners”. Some are being held as members of the Jordanian reform movement and are charged with “seeking to undermine the regime” and similar offences. They have been joined by Dr Muhammad Said Bakr, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood Shura Council, who was detained two months ago, and by Zaki Bani Irshid, Deputy Inspector General of the Brotherhood, who was detained three weeks ago.

There are also another eighteen people who have been detained similarly and within a short time. These detainees have not yet been charged and continue to be interrogated at the General Intelligence Department. Their names are: Engineer Ghassan Douar and his son Al-Baraa Douar; Engineer Mazin Naifie, an ex-prisoner in Israel; Engineer Musab Jabir; Engineer Muhammad Abd Al-Fattah Ali and his brother Anas Abd Al-Fattah Ali; Engineer Hamzah Shahin; Engineer Bashir Al-Hasan and his brother Abd Al-Rahman Al-Hasan; Engineer Anas Awwad; Engineer Wasfi Al-Habab; Khalid Al-Daoum, a documentary film producer; Ahmad Abu Khdair, an ex-prisoner in Israel; Idris Al-Rufati; Muhammad Qandil; Faraj Hanani; Tamir Al-Haj Ali; and Muhammad Al-Qurnah.

Most of these eighteen individuals are yellow card holders. Three have green cards and happen to be students from the West Bank. They live in Jordan while they are studying: Faraj Hanani hails from Beitu Fourik in the Nablus region. He has a Master’s degree in the arts and was arrested more than a month ago by Jordanian intelligence agents at Amman Airport as he was about to board a plane for Malaysia where he intended to study for his PhD. Tamir Al-Haj Ali is from Jamma’in, also in the Nablus area. He was a student of ICT at Jadara University and was arrested a month ago while at work in a supermarket in Irbid, in the north of Jordan. Muhammad Al-Qurnah comes from Bethlehem and was a student at the University of Science and Technology. His family and people close to him have said that he disappeared in Jordan two weeks ago. Some of his friends have confirmed that he was detained inside the Intelligence Department after its agents lured him there. The agency has denied this. Al-Qurnah’s family fear that their son might have been handed over by Jordan to Israeli intelligence.

Speaking exclusively to Noon Post, an anonymous source has said that Jordanian Intelligence is interrogating these eighteen detainees on the basis that they are accused of “involvement in supporting the Palestinian resistance with finance, information and logistics in planning operations against the state of Israel and forming a clandestine military organisation inside Jordan.”

According to some leaked information, the intelligence service claims that there is a link between these detainees and the members of the cell detained by Shin Bet in the West Bank. The Jordanians accuse detainee Al-Daoum of supporting this cell and acting as a go-between for information, while Shahin is accused of transferring money and information from his brother who lives in Turkey and who is said to be a leading figure in Hamas. The leak also points out that most of the detainees in Jordan have not thus far made any confessions that would implicate them in any activities associated with military operations inside or outside Jordan.

However, some have confessed to providing some young people with training and funding, and planning with them to carry out operations that may support resistance inside occupied Palestine. More arrests are expected in the next few days, based on these confessions.

According to various sources, it is certain that all of the interrogations of recent detainees are focused on “supporting resistance inside Palestine”. Furthermore, they are based on very high level security cooperation and coordination with Israeli intelligence. On the same day that Shin Bet arrested Engineer Abdullah Al-Zitawi in the West Bank, for example, its Jordanian counterparts raided his home in the Tabarbour neighbourhood of Amman, searched it thoroughly and seized some of the contents.

A Muslim Brotherhood source, who preferred to remain anonymous, said that the group has semi-confirmed that Jordanian Intelligence is heading towards charging the movement with forming a “clandestine military wing” that threatens the Kingdom’s security. This would, it is believed, lead to escalating action against it and the arrest of some Brotherhood leaders on charges linked to “terrorism” offences. Commentators point out that this would be a convenient way for the Jordanian government to ban the Muslim Brotherhood in Jordan. Even so, the same source anticipates that the case may take a different direction towards a less damaging scenario, namely that all of those who have been detained end up being prosecuted and that would be the end of the affair; there would be no direct or explicit indictment of the Brotherhood itself. This is the essence of what leading Islamist Murad Al-Adaylah told Aljazeera a few days ago. Commenting on reports circulated by some websites that Jordan was heading for a ban on the movement, Al-Adaylah said: “Those who want to incriminate the Brotherhood, accusing it of terrorism and of forming armed cells, do not realise the seriousness of such a step, which will provoke society and public opinion. All of this is aimed simply at persuading the decision-makers of the necessity of accusing the Brotherhood in Jordan of terrorism on the basis of the fabrication of illusory organisations.”

The families of the latest batch of detainees deny categorically that they have been involved in any military or similar activities, whether inside or outside Jordan. Some have asked some pertinent questions.

Suppose the charges are correct and are proven to be accurate, they ask, since when has supporting the Palestinian resistance against Israel’s brutal military occupation turned into a “crime” in Jordan, of all Arab states, given its closeness to occupied Palestine nationally, historically and geographically? Indeed, the families are wondering when resisting the occupation was designated as “terrorism” in Jordan. This is a good point, not least because resistance against occupation using all possible means is entirely legitimate under international laws and conventions. Finally, they want to know if this case will open new doors for high level overt security coordination and cooperation between Jordan and Israel in the future.

They are very good questions. They demand equally good answers.

Translated from Noonpost, 3 December, 2014