MOSCOW. (RIA Novosti political commentator Marianna Belenkaya.) -- Jordan has become a new target for terrorists. Until now, Jordan seemed one of the calmest countries in the Middle East, but to a significant extent this was a superficial impression.
Yesterday's bombings are another reason to think about what is going on in the Middle East. What are the roots of the problem?
The Jordanian authorities have blamed the attacks on Al-Qaida's Jihad in Iraq, led by Jordanian native Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. However, despite the origin of the No. 2 terrorist (after Osama bin Laden), the country's leadership has pointed to the outside reasons of the tragedy.
They are right. The situation in Iraq, U.S. policy in the country and in the entire region, as well as the conflict between Arabs and Israelis - this cannot but affect Jordan, which borders on both Iraq and Israel.
Jordan has long been a transit route to Iraq. It accommodates representative offices of companies that left Baghdad before the war. Amman frequently hosts diplomatic and economic talks related to Iraq. And it has always supported Baghdad in any circumstances and under any regime. On the one hand, it was the first country to provide asylum to Saddam Hussein's daughters, but on the other hand, it was the first Arab country to send its ambassador to Iraq. Incidentally, the Jordan embassy was among the first foreign missions to be attacked by terrorists.
Jordan is also one of the mediators in the Palestinian-Israeli settlement, and one of the few Arab countries that has diplomatic relations with Israel. Their bilateral economic and humanitarian contacts are also developing. Moreover, Jordan is one of Washington's closest allies in the Middle East. In 1996, it was granted the status of the "major non-NATO ally" of the United States. In 2000, it became the world's fourth nation to sign a free trade agreement with America.
All this said, King Abdullah II is trying to conduct policies independent of his Western allies. His commitments to them did not stop him from canceling his visit to Washington in April 2004 after U.S. President George Bush spoke in favor of Israel's plans for unilateral separation from Palestine. The King is ready to broker for Washington and Damascus in order to prevent another conflict in the region. To a certain extent, Jordan is the prototype of the dream of a New Middle East where wars have been replaced with pragmatism and business cooperation.
So it is not a coincidence that Jordan was the first target of al-Zarqawi's group after it had announced its intention to expand outside Iraq.
Until now, Jordan had never had terrorist attacks on such a scale, although the local authorities know the problem of terror too well. The country often witnesses trials of Islamists suspected of organizing attacks. Verdicts are usually very tough, either life imprisonment or a death sentence. Shortly before yesterday's attacks, a Jordanian court convicted six extremists of an underground group, "Khattab's Squadron." They were accused of planning and preparing raids on hotels where tourists from the United States, Israel and West Europe stay, as well as on stores selling alcohol.
As for the al-Zarqawi group, the Jordanian authorities blame it for firing at American military vessels in the port of Aqaba last August. One of the missiles fell in the Israeli resort town of Eilat. Al-Zarqawi was convicted in Jordan in absence for his involvement in the murder of US diplomat Lawrence Foley in 2002. Seven other Islamists were sentenced to death for the same offense. This was not the first attack against foreign diplomats. In 2001, Yitzhak Snir, an official of the Israeli embassy in Amman, was murdered. Yet until very recently, Jordanians felt relatively safe. The hotel bombings have shown that no one is protected from terrorists. Although there are foreigners among casualties, most victims are citizens of Jordan.
It may be worth mentioning the background of the attacks that is not so much national as regional. The problem is in the strengthening of political radical Islam. In the early 1990s some countries could cope with the phenomenon or did not consider it too dangerous (in 1999, the Jordanian authorities pardoned al-Zarqawi, sentenced to 15 years in jail, under a general amnesty). They overlooked for too long terrorist attacks conducted under the motto of a fight against occupants, either Americans or Israelis. Of course, outside factors do boost terrorists' positions, and the United States should bear in mind that trying to bring order to one country, whether Iraq or Syria, it destabilizes the situation in the whole of Middle East. But Muslim countries should also ask themselves what they have done in order to prevent terrorists' strengthening.
To Jordan's credit, it has done a lot. But, evidently, not enough. Apparently, given close regional connections, it cannot cope on its own.
