MP calls for Jordan not to extradite freed Palestinian prisoner to US

Yahya Al-Saud, Jordanian MP and chairman of Palestine Committee in Jordanian Parliament, has called for Amman not to accept a US request to extradite freed female Palestinian prisoner Ahlam Al-Tamimi, Al-Resalah newspaper reported yesterday .

This call came in the wake of reports about tension between the US administration and Amman over the latter’s rejection of requests to extradite Al-Tamimi, who holds a Jordanian passport.

“The Jordanian government must protect its citizens and America cannot take on the role of international police officer,” Al-Saud said. “[America] has to take the side of the peace camp, not oppression camp,” he added.

“I think that I am representing the view of the Jordanian public in saying that the US is a partner in the occupation [of Palestine] through several measures it has taken in this regard.”

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Al-Saud added: “Ahlam was sentenced and released. It is not acceptable to be sentenced twice. However, she did not commit a crime, but defended her country.”

In March 2017, the Jordanian Court of Cassation upheld a ruling of a lower court that Amman must not extradite Ahlam to the US as she is a Jordanian citizen.

Al-Tamimi was arrested by the Israeli occupation forces in 2001, sentenced and spent ten years in jail before she was released to Jordan in 2011 as part of a prisoner swap reached between the Palestinian resistance and Israel.

In 2017 she was included in the FBI’s most wanted list.

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