Jordanians protest against secret Israel gas deal

(AhlulBayt News Agency) - Thousands of protesters swamped the centre of Amman on Friday to demonstrate against the behind-closed-doors signing of an energy deal to bring Israeli gas into Jordan - a move condemned by opponents as a sop to the "Zionist entity" and against Jordanian interests.

Crowds chanted "Raise your voice in Amman" and "the people want national dignity" in protest at the government over the deal, in a demonstration titled "The enemy's gas is occupation".

An estimated 2,000 people took part in the peaceful demonstration, which was closed down by police after about half an hour.

The protest follows the signing this week of a deal to import natural gas from the Leviathan field off the coast of Israel between Jordanian National Electric Power Company (NEPCO) and the US-owned Noble Energy, which is a majority partner in extraction.

The "National Campaign to Overturn the Gas Deal with the Zionist Entity", a broad coalition of civil society groups, activists, lawyers and political groups, is stepping up efforts to protest the agreement despite its finalisation.

Aside from protests, the coalition has also convened a "people’s court" with the purpose of mobilising lawyers to protest the deal on a legal basis.

The group’s campaign slogan, "the enemy’s gas is occupation", has rapidly spread through Jordanian social media. At a protest outside the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources in Amman this Tuesday, Middle East Eye talked to Khaled, a member of the campaign and organiser of the demonstration.

“The government is blurring things out and hasn’t been straight since the beginning,” he said. “Its response is that there is no substitute for the gas - but there are many other sources.”

The campaign accuses the government of undemocratic practices. While parliament voted against the deal in December 2014, it was approved in the period before this month’s election when parliament was dissolved.

Members of the public were also not consulted on the matter, though a poll by Nabd al-Balad found that 90 percent of respondents rejected the deal.

Hisham Bustani, a member of the campaign and writer for 7iber, described the secrecy surrounding the deal to Middle East Eye. The campaign submitted a freedom of information request to see the agreement. The government responded saying that the deal is “secret”.

It has yet to make a public statement about the deal.

“We learned about the deal being signed through international media,” said Bustani. “The government prefers to be an agent for outside capital instead of developing the country and maintaining sovereignty.”

With the country flooded with US aid, Bustani pointed towards US pressure and government, as opposed to national, interests as reasons behind the deal.

“There is some sort of corruption going on,” he said, adding that the price of the Israeli gas is higher than market price - and higher than that which Jordan already imports from Shell to Aqaba.



/257