A Very alarming article by Dore Gold - Growing al-Qaida threat to Jordan worries Israel

Growing al-Qaida threat to Jordan worries Israel
By Martin WalkerUPI Editor
UNITED PRESS INTERNATIONAL
Published December 16, 2005

WASHINGTON -- Israel faces an ominous new threat on its eastern front, where Jordan is under pressure from political and religious radicalization spearheaded by al-Qaida, says a top Israeli policy adviser.

"There are serious implications for Israel in the future from the growth of al-Qaida-related terrorism, as exemplified by the attacks of the Zarqawi network in Jordan," claims Dore Gold, Israel's former ambassador to the United Nations, in a new policy paper just published by Israel's Institute for Contemporary Affairs.

"After the November 2005 suicide attacks on three hotels in Amman, King Abdullah stressed that this was the work of Iraqis and not Jordanians," Gold writes. "The Western press went out of its way to emphasize how Jordanian opinion had turned against terrorist groups that would kill innocent Jordanian civilians. This analysis, however, tended to paper over the radicalization that segments of Jordanian society had undergone as a result of the Iraq War." Gold cites a poll by the Pew Global Attitudes Project in mid-2005 which revealed that 60 percent of Jordanians expressed a lot or some confidence in Osama bin Laden. In comparison, in Morocco, only 26 percent responded the same way, and in Lebanon just two percent were willing to express support for bin Laden. More worrying, Gold suggests, was that Jordanian sympathy for bin Laden was increasing in comparison with Pew's findings in 2003, while such sympathy was decreasing at the same time in Morocco, Lebanon, and Turkey.

"The radicalization of Jordanian opinion has many sources," Gold suggests, in his new analysis, 'Zarqawi and Israel: Is There a New Jihadi Threat Destabilizing the Eastern Front?' It is co-authored with Lt. Col. Jonathan D. Halevi, a former advisor to the Policy Planning Division of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

"Some attribute it (this radicalization) to the Iraq War; if that is the case, then as the Sunni insurgency in Iraq persists, the process of radicalization is likely to continue, even if there was a discernable downturn after the November bombings in Amman," the paper says.

"But even prior to the U.S. invasion of Iraq, the emergence of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, now infamous as the al-Qaida terrorist leader in Iraq, was not a unique phenomenon in northern Jordan. In the late 1990s, it had been reported that 500 men from Zarqa and the adjacent Palestinian refugee camp were in Afghanistan fighting with the Taliban. The neighboring city of Salt has contributed even more mujahideen that have been killed in Iraq than Zarqa, including the suicide bomber who murdered 125 Shiites in one attack on Feb. 28, 2005. What is striking is that many of these volunteers came from the same Transjordanian Bedouin background as Zarqawi."

Jordan has one of the best intelligence services in the Arab world, particularly in response to domestic challenges, Dore notes. But as the threats come from outside its porous borders with Iraq or Syria or even Saudi Arabia, Jordan will have a far more difficult time contending with the threat of terrorism.

"In the past, Israel could be certain that if there was a violent organization determined to attack it from Jordanian territory, the Hashemites would not permit their kingdom to be exploited for such purposes," Gold writes. "With the spread of al-Qaida-related terrorism throughout the countries neighboring Jordan, the kingdom's capacity to block such attacks may be reduced."

"Israel's national security doctrine for decades viewed the Jordan Valley as critical for Israel's security from threats along its Eastern Front," Gold continues, as part of his strong contention that Israel must buttress its defenses on the eastern front.

"Were Israel to make a territorial withdrawal from the strategic barrier it controls in the Jordan Valley (which it once considered at Camp David in 2000), then Israeli vulnerability could very well attract more global jihadi elements to Jordan, who would seek to use the kingdom as a platform to reach the West Bank and then target Israel's civilian infrastructure," he argues.

"Those advocating such a withdrawal take for granted that Jordan will remain a stable buffer that can thwart threats to its own security and to the security of Israel, as well. Jordanian stability is a global interest of the entire Western alliance. It can only be hoped that this beleaguered state will be provided the resources it needs by the United States and its allies to contend with the new threat environment it faces."

"In the past, radical challenges to the Hashemite regime emanated from the Palestinian population in Jordan," Gold contends. "With the spread of Islamic militancy in Jordan, the Hashemites are now facing an added internal threat from the direction of those who had been its most important pillars of support. Of course, Transjordanians had been involved in the Muslim Brotherhood in the past, but they were primarily active in its pragmatic wing that worked with the Jordanian government."

What changed, says Gold, was the arrival of Muslim fundamentalism, specifically the coming of Salafi jihadists. He says this first became apparent in 1993, when Jordanian security forces uncovered a plot by Hizb ut-Tahrir to assassinate King Hussein. Radical Islamists set off bombs in cinemas in Amman and Zarqa in 1994.

"But now there is a danger of this activity becoming more widespread," Gold stresses. "Jordanian security officials have estimated that recently 500 Jordanians have been arrested for links with al-Qaida. Indeed, according to a report in the London Sunday Times, Jordanian security sources believed that the Iraqi suicide bombers who attacked in Amman received help from Jordanian soldiers. If the report is true, it means that Zarqawi's network had penetrated the Jordanian defense establishment in a manner reminiscent of al-Qaida's recruitment of members of the Saudi National Guard."

"Jordan now faces multiple challenges to its security," Gold concludes. "It hosts nearly half a million Iraqi refugees, some of whom could be recruited for jihadi activities. Its border with the Sunni portions of Iraq is relatively porous. In addition, Jordan will undoubtedly be affected by developments within two other neighbors -- Syria to the north and Saudi Arabia to the south. Saudi clashes with local al-Qaida cells have become a regular occurrence since May 2003. Syria, which serves as the main conduit for the mujahideen fighting for the insurgency in Iraq, is paying a price for this role."

As the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad becomes further isolated and embattled by the pressures of the international community due to its involvement in the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri, Gold suggests that militant Islamic elements, that have grown with the Syrian involvement in Iraq, will become emboldened.

"All this will have implications for Jordan," Gold suggests. "Zarqawi's strategy is based on a significant escalation of the destructive power of terrorist attacks: from bringing down U.N. headquarters in Baghdad to trying to destroy whole hotels elsewhere. Of greatest concern has been his readiness to employ even the crudest weapons of mass destruction. The sophistication of his network is bound to increase. It becomes a paramount interest for Israel to recognize the changing threat of terrorism as Zarqawi's network threatens to become active in the Israeli-Palestinian struggle."

"Al-Qaida's global strategy has been to seek the weakest link in any region it hopes to penetrate," Gold writes. "Al-Qaida thrives in weak or failed states like Sudan, Afghanistan, remote Iraqi Kurdistan prior to the 2003 U.S. invasion, or Chechnya. If the state structures are in a process of being built up, al-Qaida is seeking to destabilize them by increasing insurgent activities. That has been the primary goal of Zarqawi's network in Iraq and is likely to become his chief political strategy in Syria and Jordan. All of this indicates that the region to Israel's east is likely to enter a period of greater instability."