AMMAN –
Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi said on Sunday that the kingdom demanded an international investigation into what it said were many war crimes committed during Israel’s military campaign in Gaza.
In remarks made during a news conference with the head of the UN Palestinian refugee agency (UNRWA), Safadi said those responsible for documented crimes should be brought to justice.
Jordan has a peace treaty with Israel and is dependent on the US for aid and security. Last month, it helped Israel shoot down missiles and rockets launched by Iran.
However, King Abdullah has been critical of Israel’s conduct in Gaza.
“The war crimes that are being committed must stop,” Safadi said.
“They must be investigated and those responsible for them must be held accountable. Jordan has been doing everything it can to bring about that objective,” he added.
Jordan “alone cannot do it,” he said, adding that “ultimately, the responsibility for stopping this aggression is on Israel.”
Safadi added Israel’s alleged “use of starvation as a weapon of war” constituted a war crime.
“There is an illegal inhuman aggression going on in Gaza, the victims of which are innocent civilians,” he said, adding that the seven-month war “continues to aggravate a humanitarian catastrophe.”
Prolonged ceasefire efforts by the US and regional countries have not succeeded, with Israel saying it intends to broaden its military operation in Rafah.
A senior aide to US President Joe Biden has warned against major action in the southern Gazan city that may risk mass civilian casualties.
Israel describes Rafah, which abuts the Gaza Strip’s border with the Egyptian Sinai, as the last stronghold of Hamas Islamists whose governing and combat capabilities it has been trying to dismantle during the more than seven-month-old war.
After weeks of public disagreements with Washington over the Rafah planning, Israel on May 6 ordered Palestinian civilians to evacuate parts of the city and began troop and tank incursions.
“We are committed to broadening the ground operation in Rafah to the end of dismantling Hamas and recovering the hostages,” a statement from the office of Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant quoted him as telling visiting US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan.
Western powers and Egypt have voiced concern over the fate of hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians sheltering there, despite Israeli assurances about humanitarian safeguards.
The UN agency for Palestinian refugees UNRWA said on Monday that it estimated 810,000 people had fled Rafah since May 6, potentially more than half of the city’s wartime population.
During Sunday’s news conference, Safadi said Israel was defying the world by maintaining Rafah as a target.
“The whole world has been telling Israel: don’t go into Rafah because that will be a catastrophe,” he said. “Israel is not listening and is continuing with the operation.”
Before Israel’s hardline government came to power at the end of 2022, the country had been improving ties with Jordan, including the revival of bilateral talks on business projects, supported by Washington.
Safadi said the “radicalised” government of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu is leading the region “to more war”, while disregarding a renewed international drive for a permanent settlement of the conflict.
“If you listen to rhetoric coming out of Israeli officials in the last few days, they are saying no two-state solution, no political will, no political future,” he said.
“You have a country that occupies five million people in both the West Bank and Gaza, and is telling them: ‘You have no future.’”
