Three American service members were killed and many were wounded in a drone strike in Jordan, President Joe Biden said in a statement Sunday. He attributed the attack to Iran-backed militia groups. They were the first US fatalities in months of strikes against American forces across the Middle East by Iranian-backed militias amid the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, increasing the risk of escalation. Biden said the United States will hold all those responsible to account at a time and in a manner our choosing. There was no immediate reaction from Jordan, a kingdom bordering Iraq, Israel, the Palestinian territory of the West Bank, Saudi Arabia and Syria. US troops long have used Jordan as a basing point. Some 3,000 American troops typically are stationed in Jordan. Since Israel's war on Hamas in the Gaza Strip began, US troops in Iraq and Syria have faced drone and missile attacks on their bases. The attack on Jordan marks the first targeting American troops in Jordan during the war. Bi
An airstrike on southern Syria early Thursday killed at least nine people and was probably carried out by Jordan's air force, Syrian opposition activists said, the latest in a series of strikes in an area where cross-border drug smugglers have been active. There was no immediate confirmation from Jordan on the strike that hit the province of Sweida, The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition war monitor, said nine people, including two children and at least three women, were killed in the strike on the village of Orman. The head of the Observatory, Rami Abdurrahman, said the people killed had nothing to do with smuggling, suggesting that the Jordanian air force might have received incorrect intelligence from local residents. Smugglers have used Jordan as a corridor over the past years to smuggle highly addictive Captagon amphetamines out of Syria, mainly to oil-rich Arab Gulf states. The Jordanian authorities have managed to stop several smuggling attempts
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken met on Sunday with Jordan's king and foreign minister and visited a World Food Programme warehouse in Amman as he pressed ahead with an urgent Middle East diplomatic mission to prevent Israel's war against Hamas in Gaza from spreading. On his fourth visit to the region in three months, Blinken stressed the need for Israel to adjust its military operations to reduce civilian casualties and significantly boost the amount of humanitarian aid reaching Gaza while highlighting the importance of preparing detailed plans for the post-conflict future of the territory, which has been decimated by intensive Israeli airstrikes and ground offensives. After a day of talks with Turkish and Greek leaders in Istanbul and Crete, Blinken met Sunday with Jordan's King Abdullah II and Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi seeking buy-in for US efforts to tamp down resurgent fears that the three-month-old war could engulf the region, ramp up aid deliveries to Gaza and prepare
Lupin Limited has partnered with pharmaceutical manufacturer Amman Pharmaceuticals Industries for exclusive marketing and commercialisation of Ranibizumab in the West Asian region
As Israel defends its citizens and fights terrorists, Biden emphasised the significance of upholding international humanitarian law and preserving civilian life
In its review published on October 27, FATF has added Bulgaria to the grey list
Economic crises are rippling through the countries bordering Israel, raising the possibility of a chain reaction from the war with Hamas that further worsens the financial health and political stability of Egypt, Jordan and Lebanon and creates problems well beyond. Each of the three countries is up against differing economic pressures that led the International Monetary Fund to warn in a September report that they could lose their "sociopolitical stability." That warning came shortly before Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, triggering a war that could easily cause economic chaos that President Joe Biden and the European Union would likely need to address. The possible fallout is now starting to be recognized by world leaders and policy analysts. For a Biden administration committed to stopping the Israel-Hamas war from widening, the conflict could amplify the economic strains and possibly cause governments to collapse. If the chaos went unchecked, it could spread across a region that
This comes after the Hamas attack on Israel in which more than 1,400 Israelis were killed, mostly in the initial Hamas attack
Both leaders underscored the need for concerted efforts to achieve an early resolution to the security and humanitarian challenges that have arisen as a result of the war
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US President Joe Biden on Tuesday left the White House for a quick trip to Israel to show solidarity with the people of the country in the aftermath of the terrorist attack by Hamas. However, Biden had to abruptly scrap his trip to Jordan for a meeting with leaders of Jordan, Egypt and Palestine after the Palestinian Authority cancelled the summit following a huge explosion at a hospital in Gaza. Hundreds of civilians are feared dead after a deadly blast at the Al Ahli Arab hospital in Gaza. Israel has denied its involvement in the bombing, while the Palestinians have held it responsible. I am outraged and deeply saddened by the explosion at the Al Ahli Arab hospital in Gaza, and the terrible loss of life that resulted. Immediately upon hearing this news, I spoke with King Abdullah II of Jordan, and Prime Minister Netanyahu of Israel and have directed my national security team to continue gathering information about what exactly happened, Biden said in a statement minutes before he
In videos, the protesters in Ramallah were seen chanting "The people want the fall of the President."
President Joe Biden's efforts to tamp down tensions in the escalating war between Israel and Hamas faced a bloody setback Tuesday when, shortly before his expected departure for the Middle East, Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas withdrew from scheduled meetings to protest an explosion at a Gaza hospital that killed hundreds. The Hamas-run Health Ministry in Gaza blamed the blast on an Israeli airstrike but the Israeli military said it had no involvement and pinned the blame on a misfired Palestinian rocket. Abbas' cancellation, disclosed by a senior Palestinian official, reflects an increasingly volatile situation that will test the limits of American influence in the region as Biden visits Israel and Jordan on Wednesday. Biden's decision to put himself in a conflict zone the same year he made a surprise visit to Ukraine demonstrates his willingness to take personal and political risks as he becomes heavily invested in another intractable foreign conflict with no clear end game and
A huge explosion at a Gaza hospital has derailed the diplomatic efforts led by the US to mobilise support for "Israel's right to defend itself" with a summit meeting between American President Joe Biden and other leaders in Jordan's Amman being called off. Hundreds of people are feared dead after a deadly blast at a hospital in Gaza for which Hamas and Israel traded charges holding each other responsible for the incident. Biden is scheduled to arrive in Israel on Wednesday on a solidarity visit to express support for Israel. Jordan's Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi announced that Biden's summit in Amman scheduled to take place on Wednesday with Jordan's King Abdullah, Egypt's President Abdel Fattah El-Sissi and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has been cancelled. Biden has been backing Israeli calls for eliminating Hamas following the attacks carried out by it on Israel on October 7 in which more than 1,300 people were killed and between 200 and 250 Israelis are said to
Jordan's Attarat power plant was envisioned as a landmark project promising to provide the desert kingdom with a major source of energy while solidifying its relations with China. But weeks after its official opening, the site, a sea of black, crumbly rock in the barren desert south of Jordan's capital, is instead a source of heated controversy. Deals surrounding the plant put Jordan on the hook for billions of dollars in debt to China all for a plant that is no longer needed for its energy, because of other agreements made since the project's conception. The result is fueling tensions between China and Jordan and causing grief for the Jordanian government as it tries to contest the deal in an international legal battle. As Chinese influence grows in the Middle East and America withdraws, the $2.1 billion shale oil station has come to characterize China's wider model that has burdened many Asian and African states with crippling debt and served as a cautionary tale for the ...
Jordan suspended its oil imports from Iraqi after the previous extension expired on March 31
The Jordanian armed forces said in a statement that a rocket exploded in the air over Jordanian territories near the border with Syria, and no injuries were reported
Jordan's Finance Minister Mohammad al-Ississ said the country's economy is expected to grow by 2.7 per cent in 2023
Jordan's Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Arab Mining Company to explore lithium and gold in southern Jordan
Jordan and Egypt have agreed to increase their exchange of expertise in the fields of mining, petrochemical industry, oil and natural gas, according to a statement by Jordan's Ministry of Energy