While Israel Unstintingly Helps Jordan, Jordan Rails About Israel’s Unsurpassed Villainy

At the same time that Hamas has referred to these “30,000” people killed in Gaza, the IDF has calculated that it has killed abut 15,000 of Hamas’ fighters. That means the ratio of civilians to combatants killed is 15:15 or 1:1. One civilian in Gaza is killed for every combatant. That is an astonishing achievement. To appreciate why, consider that ratio in other wars. In all the wars since 1945, the UN has calculated an average civilian-to-combatant ratio of 9:1. The Americans and British have brought that ratio way down. In Afghanistan, they managed to attain a ratio of 4:1. In Iraq the Americans did even better, with a 3:1 ratio: three civilians killed for every fighter. But now Israel has done even better: in Gaza it has managed to achieve a ratio of 1:1. To repeat: in Gaza, the numbers of civilians and combatants killed are roughly equal. It is this amazingly low ratio which is one of the reasons that the commander of British forces in Afghanistan, Colonel Kemp, has described the IDF as “the most moral army in the history of modern warfare.” And John Spencer, a professor of urban warfare at West Point, has similarly noted on Twitter that “IMO Israel has implemented more measures to prevent civilian casualties in urban warfare than any other military in the history of war. This includes many measure the U.S. has (or has not) taken in wars & battles but also many measures no military in the world has ever taken.” None of this will make an impression on Jordanian Prime Minister Ayman Safadi. His mind is made up about Israel’s unsurpassed villainy. So is the mind of UN Secretary-General Guterres, and that of the EU’s Foreign Minister Josep Borrell. Don’t confuse them with facts. Israel is the settler-colonial apartheid genocidal state, the international pariah, condemned to be alone.

Jordan has been mistreating the Jewish state that has been unstintingly helping it: “After slamming Israel, Jordan now wants more Israeli water – analysis,” by Herb Keinon, Jerusalem Post, March 5, 2024:

Jordan, since October 7, has recalled its ambassador and asked the Israeli envoy in Amman to leave the country.

Not a syllable of sympathy for the people of Israel has been uttered by Amman since the atrocities of October 7. Not a hint of understanding the national trauma in Israel. No comprehension of why Israel must dismantle Hamas, once and for all, as a military menace. Instead, Jordan acts as the offended party, standing up for its fellow Muslim Arabs in Hamas by recalling its ambassador from Israel.

Fast forward some three and a half months, and Jordan, according to a report on Sunday on Kan 11, asked Israel to renew a deal whereby Israel sells the water-deficient Hashemite Kingdom an additional 50 million cubic meters of water over and beyond the 50m. cm. that it is obligated to provide under the 1994 peace treaty….

Israel is reviewing the request. Reportedly, it has let it be known that it has a few conditions. First and foremost, softening the Erdogan-like anti-Israel rhetoric coming from top Jordanian officials. Secondly, restoring diplomatic relations – meaning an exchange of ambassadors – to where they were before October 7.

It’s about time.“Good neighborly relations” is a two-way street, and the anti-Israel rhetoric and incitement coming from Jordan since October 7 is not exactly the way to foster those positive bilateral ties.

It is not only the Jordanian labor unions, parliamentarians, or Safadi who are piling on. A couple of weeks after October 7, when the images from that savage day were still fresh, Jordan’s Queen Rania gave an unforgettable interview to CNN when she questioned the veracity of reports about the brutality of the attacks. And on a trip to Washington last month, King Abdullah lamented “seven decades of occupation, death, and destruction,” borrowing language used by those who see Israel’s very existence as an “occupation,” not just settlement beyond the Green Line after the 1967 Six-Day War….

Months passed during which Jordan’s media, and government officials, hurled their invective nonstop at the Jewish state for daring to defend itself. Queen Rania was the worst of the bunch in questioning, during an interview on CNN, the truthfulness of reports from Israel about “atrocities.” There was no basis for any doubt; the mutilated corpses were photographed; the survivors described the horrors they saw; the first responders had their own ghastly tales to tell; the IDF distributed a 45-minute video showing rapes and murders as they were being committed, as many of the segments in the video were shot by the Hamas rapists murderers themselves, as they were so proud of their ghastly handiwork.