A boycott poster produced by qawem.net, an anti-normalization website closed by the Jordanian government

AMMAN, October 16 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - A senior Jordanian government official has called for the dissolution of committees linked to trade unions that are opposed to the normalization of ties with Israel, the press reported Wednesday, October 16.

“These committees must be dissolved because they cause huge losses for the national economy estimated at millions of dinars and harm Jordanian interests,” Minister of State for Political Affairs Mohammad Adwan said.

“The anti-normalization committees linked to some trade unions are illegal and their activities are a flagrant challenge to Jordanian laws,” said Adwan, who is also government spokesman and information minister.

Adwan made the remarks to Amman dailies after a weekly cabinet meeting late Tuesday as trade unions began to set up defense councils for three labor leaders jailed since October 7 for anti-Israeli activities.

The secretary general of the Jordanian engineers’ union, Ali Abu Sukkar, as well as union members Mayssarah Malla and Badi Rafayeh were ordered held for a renewable period of 15 days a day after their arrest in Amman.

State prosecutor Mahmoud Obeidat of the military state security court accused the three men of “membership of an illegal organization”, in reference to their membership in an anti-Israeli normalization committee.

Judicial sources said the three published leaflets opposed to normalization of ties between Jordan and Israel, which have been bound by a peace treaty since 1994.

Their union has demanded their release and vowed in a statement to “boycott those dealing” with the Jewish state, in reference to Jordanian firms that do business with Israel.

But Adwan insisted that the peace treaty with Israel was “legal”.  He stressed that the companies targeted by the unions “operate with 100 percent Jordanian capital, workers and production” and were expected to export to the United States 500 million dollars worth of good this year.

Interior Minister Koftan Majali echoed Adwan’s comments in remarks carried on the front pages of Amman daily newspapers including Al-Rai and Al-Dustur.

The authorities would deal firmly with any illegal trade union activities, he warned.

Most of Jordan’s trade unions and opposition parties, including Muslim groups, have repeatedly called on the government to sever ties with Israel and expel its ambassador from Amman.

The ministers added that the anti-normalization committees slander individuals and companies in nearby friendly countries which may negatively affect the Jordanian economy, Al-Dustur said.

They said that the Jordanian-Israeli treaty is immune by law and is given priority from among other laws and that the activities of these committees are illegal and could be considered as ‘intellectual terrorism’, the paper said.

In April, the Jordanian government blocked a website that called people to resist normalization with Israel and to boycott American products. The site issued a booklet in which they instruct demonstrators on the right way to deal with the security officers who will try to come in their way during a demonstration they were organizing against the Israeli embassy.

The site, which was set up by Jordanian students, was still closed down as this article was being written.

On April 28, the boycott office affiliated to the Arab League held a three day meeting in Damascus, Syria and decided to include a number of international companies which deal with Israel to its boycott list.

There were participants from 19 countries to the meeting, while three countries, which have diplomatic relations with Israel (Jordan, Egypt and Mauritania), were absent.

The Boycott Office was established in the Arab League in 1951 and established every six months a list of Israeli companies which must be directly boycotted as well as a list of international companies which deal with Israel which should be boycotted indirectly.

After the start of the peace process in 1991 between the Arabs and Israel, most Arab states have refrained from the indirect boycotting.

In the final communiqué of the Arab Summit which was held in Beirut in March 28, the meeting heads of state stressed the importance of activating the Boycott Office in order to force Israel to carry out the international agreements and the Madrid Peace resolutions and to withdraw from all Arab lands occupied on June 4, 1967.  

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