16.04.2011                      12.Nisan, 5771

Feature:

Arab World: The kingdom’s fearless radicals

Jihadi forces are threatening to carry out attacks in Jordan forcing the state to beef up security. Have Islamists lost their fear of authorities?

The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan was expected by some observers to be the first Arab Middle Eastern state to experience sweeping changes.
It has surprised many by remaining relatively calm in the eye of the current regional storm, but Jordanian- based extremist forces are increasingly fearless about raising their profile. They are openly issuing calls for the kingdom to be converted into a fundamentalist state that would be ruled according to a stringent interpretation of Islamic law, and hostile to Israel and the West.
In many ways, Jordan, which shares a 500-kilometer border with Israel, has always been the most important of Israel’s neighbors, a firm bedrock of stability on the eastern flank in an unstable region….