Jordanians Demand Severance of Diplomatic Relations With Israel

For the eighth consecutive night on Sunday, thousands of people demanded the severing of diplomatic relations with Israel.

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The massive protests took place in the Rabieh suburb, in the city of Amman, where the embassy of the Zionist state is located.

Besides calling for an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip, protesters demanded the breaking of the Wadi Araba Peace Treaty signed between Jordan and Israel in 1994.

“Wadi Araba is not peace, Wadi Araba is capitulation,” chanted the people who participated in the demonstrations, which have increased in strength since the beginning of Ramadan.

According to images broadcast by the Al-Mayadeen media, the protesters also chanted slogans hostile to the United States and Israel.

With signs reading "The People Are Against Normalization," protesters even demanded an end to bilateral trade relations, particularly vegetable exports to Israel.

The protests included students, lawyers, doctors and political activists, some of whom were arrested by police, as reported by Al-Mayadeen.

Currently, the weight of the Palestinian community within the population residing in Jordan is significant. Since the Arab-Israeli war in 1948 and after the Six-Day War in 1967, Palestinians make up almost 60 percent of the Jordanian population.

This kingdom is home to over thirteen refugee camps in which some 2.2 million Palestinians live, according to estimates by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).

The Jordanian population has repeatedly criticized its government for maintaining a too timid stance on the Palestinian issue, although King Abdullah II called for a permanent ceasefire in the Gaza Strip and is participating in the drop of humanitarian packages in the Gaza enclave.

On January 16, however, Jordanian Prime Minister Bisher Khasawneh insisted that his country's bilateral relations with the Jewish state remained strategic.