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Israel to Jordan: Reopen embassy or you will run dry

November 14, 2017 at 2:00 pm

People carry the dead body of Muhammad al-Jawawdah, who was killed by an Israeli bodyguard outside the Israeli Embassy on Sunday, in Amman, Jordan on 25 July, 2017 [Salah Malkawi/Anadolu Agency]

Israel has reportedly told Jordan that it will bring a stop to a water project from the Red Sea to the Dead Sea if Amman doesn’t allow THE Israeli embassy to reopen, Israeli media sources have said.

Israel’s Channel 10 quoted sources as saying that Benjamin Netanyahu’s government had asked Jordan to reconsider its demand to investigate an Israeli officer who killed two Jordanian citizens at the Israeli embassy in Amman three months ago.

Israel has also frozen the signing of water projects and threatened to freeze the Wadi Araba canal linking the Red Sea and the Dead Sea, which could cause Jordan to experience “thirst” as its land would dry up, its projects halted.

The Dead Sea Canal project is a common interest between Amman, Ramallah and Tel Aviv. It includes the digging of a channel which connects the Dead Sea with the Red Sea. The canal is also intended to generate hydroelectric power, which may be used to operate desalination installations, thereby increasing the amount of potable water and the water available for agriculture.

Israel is seeking through this step, which was described by the Israeli media as an “economic threat” to pressure Jordan in order not to link the guard’s trial to the opening of the embassy, especially as it recently rejected a request by Jordan to issue tenders to start the project.

Read: Israel to double number of settlers in Jordan Valley

The murder of two Jordanian citizens by an Israeli security guard at the Israeli embassy in the centre of Amman strained relations between the two sides.

The security officer at the centre of the attack was warmly greeted by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu when he returned to Tel Aviv. His identity was not made public.