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AMMAN — The Lower House tourism committee on Monday said it is currently working on a compromise to allow smoking argileh in specific public spaces and would issue its recommendations by next week.

At a special meeting designated to discuss the argileh ban, MPs brought together owners of restaurants, cafés and tourist sites that are expected to incur “huge losses” due to a government decision to ban argileh smoking at cafés, to meet with Health Minister Ali Hiasat and discuss the decision’s implications on the tourism sector.

After a heated discussion, the parties agreed to postpone any agreement until next week, so that the Health Ministry will have enough time to study new suggestions submitted by the House’s Tourism Committee.

The panel wants to grant cafés and restaurants the right to offer argileh, but in designated spaces that are no larger than 50 per cent of the outlet’s total area.

Members of the committee argued that allowing argileh at these locations guarantees that such products are not served to those aged under 18 years.

Last week, 13 MPs called for allowing the use of water pipes in specific areas.

In a memo submitted to Lower House Speaker Atef Tararwneh, the signatories proposed an amendment to the 2008 Public Health Law, under which argileh smoking is allowed in ìrestaurants, cafés and tourist sites.

Last month, the Greater Amman Ministry announced that it will not issue or renew any licences for cafés serving argileh, citing a Health Ministry request to enforce the law, which prohibits smoking in public places.

The application of the law will go into effect on April 1, since all licences issued to restaurants and cafés that offer argileh expire by March 31, according to Amman Mayor Aqel Biltaji.

AMMAN — Her Majesty Queen Rania on Monday joined students from Al Aman Fund for the Future of Orphans in a vocational training workshop at Al Quds College.

Participants at the workshop, held in cooperation with the college, discussed the outcomes of the campaign that was launched last year through the partnership of both organisations to promote vocational training amongst young Jordanians, according to a statement from Her Majesty's office.

During the event, Queen Rania praised this partnership and stressed the importance of changing society's mindset towards vocational jobs. 

She also highlighted the important role that the private sector plays in encouraging young people to participate in vocational training as well as partnering with training centres to ensure that graduates' skill match the current demands of the job market. 

Al Aman Fund Deputy Director Ibrahim Al Ahmad explained that the purpose of the workshop was to collect feedback from participants and assess whether these vocational training programmes provided trainees with the set of skills required by the job market.

Participants, who included Al Aman Fund students and graduates of Al Quds College’s vocational programme as well as donors, also discussed whether the programme helped young graduates start their own businesses.

Luminus Group CEO Ibrahim Safad presented a brief about Al Quds College Education for Employment programme and outlined future improvements that would incorporate outcomes of the workshop. 

Safad also highlighted the programme's new approaches that aim to create job opportunities for young people in different fields, the statement said.

After attending the workshop, Her Majesty toured the college and dropped in on a few classes.

In 2013, Al Aman Fund and Al Quds College signed an agreement under which the college would grant the fund a 30 per cent discount on tuition fees. In addition, a one-year fully paid scholarship was offered to Al Aman Fund beneficiaries to study filmmaking at the School of Audio Engineering. 

To date, 254 Al Aman Fund beneficiaries have studied at Al Quds College, 130 of whom joined through the vocational training campaign that was launched last year.

An independent NGO founded by Her Majesty Queen Rania in 2006, Al Aman Fund for the Future of Orphans is registered under the Ministry of Social Development to support the neediest orphans in the country.

To date, 2,304 orphans from 12 governorates have benefited from the fund — 543 of these beneficiaries are from poverty pocket areas, while 706 are students. The number of graduates who benefited from the fund has reached 1,263.

AMMAN — The Kingdom will be affected by a depression on Tuesday night that is forecast to bring heavy rain and thunderstorms as well as snow to mountainous areas, the Jordan Meteorologist Department (JMD) said on Monday.

The depression, centred over north of Cyprus, is also expected to bring down temperatures by seven to nine degrees below their annual average of 17°C during this time of the year.

“The depression is expected to bring heavy rain to all parts of the Kingdom, as well as thunder, hail and strong winds. In addition, snowfall is forecast on Wednesday and Thursday in the Sharah mountains,” JMD meteorologist, Saed Taha, told The Jordan Times.

Weather charts indicate that it is “unlikely” that the capital will receive any snow, Taha said.

“The impact of the depression is expected to start Tuesday night and prevail until the end of this week, as temperatures continue to drop,” he added.

The weather will be relatively cold on Tuesday, with clouds forming in the afternoon, according to Taha, who noted that rain will start falling in the north, expanding gradually to the central region.

Temperatures in Amman will range between a high of 16°C during the day and a low of 7°C at night, while winds will be southwesterly moderate, turning to northwesterly moderate to brisk at night, according to the JMD.

Another drop in temperatures is forecast on Wednesday, when the weather will be cold and rainy with thunder and hail expected, Taha said.

Temperatures will reach a maximum of 12°C and drop to a minimum of 4°C, while winds will be westerly to northwesterly brisk with gusts.

“Snow is expected to start falling over the Sharah mountains after midnight,” the meteorologist added.

A further drop in temperatures is forecast on Thursday, when the weather will continue to be cold and wet with thunderstorms. Snow is also expected over mountainous areas. Winds will be westerly brisk with strong gusts at times.

Daytime temperatures on Thursday will reach 10°C in the capital, dropping to 2°C at night, according to the JMD.

The impact of the depression is expected to deepen on Friday, when the weather will be very cold, cloudy and rainy, according to Taha. 

Temperatures in Amman will dip nine degrees below their annual average, ranging between a high of 9°C and a low of zero, the weather forecaster said.

Meanwhile, rainfall over the past two days had not changed storage levels at the country’s 10 major dams by Monday morning, according to Ministry of Water and Irrigation figures. 

“The dams currently hold 142 million cubic metres (mcm), which constitutes 43.5 per cent of their total capacity of 325mcm. Rainwater needs 24-48 hours to reach the dams and sometimes longer if the soil is dry,” a source at the ministry told The Jordan Times.

“The country’s 10 major dams held 181mcm or 55.6 per cent of their total capacity of 325mcm during this time last year, whereas they stored around 34.5 per cent in 2012.”

AMMAN — Balqa Applied University on Monday decided to expel seven of its students who were involved in a brawl that took place last November in Salt, where the university’s main campus is located.

In a statement sent to The Jordan Times, the university’s administration said the decision to expel the students was taken following investigations that proved their involvement in the brawl.

A fight between students from two different tribes erupted near the university’s western gate last November, leading the administration to suspend classes for several days. 

Four students and one university employee were injured in the incident, during which gunshots were fired.

Fifteen men, including students who allegedly took part in the brawl, have been charged by the State Security Court with carrying out “terrorist acts” and face life imprisonment if convicted.

The decision by the court to detain those involved in the brawl, led to chaos in Salt, which has a population of around 150,000 and lies some 35km northwest of Amman, with relatives of the detainees calling on the government to intervene and release them.

According to study published recently by the Jordanian Political Science Association, on campus fights registered from 2010 to 2013 involved 3,999 students.

Most of the students involved in the fights (89 per cent) were enrolled in faculties of humanities, noted the study, which was conducted by researcher Mahmoud Jundi.

Figures he presented indicated that only 1 per cent of those involved in the fights in the period in question, were female students.

Campus violence over the past four years resulted in 31 severe, 57 moderate and 155 slight injuries, in addition to property damage, according to the study.

AMMAN — The State Security Court sentenced on Monday a citizen to five years in prison for alleged ties to Syrian jihadist groups, the latest in a series of prison sentences for Jordanians accused of supporting armed Islamist factions in the country.

In a decision early Monday, the court handed down the sentence to Khalaq Abu Snayneh for “joining militant Islamist groups” including Jabhat Al Nusra, Al Qaeda’s affiliate in Syria.

In the charge sheet, the court accused the 25-year-old Zarqa resident of providing “weapons training” to fellow Islamist fighters while in Syria between January and June 2013.

Abu Snayneh, a veteran member of the hard-line Jordanian Jihadi Salafist movement, marks the 16th citizen to receive a prison sentence for alleged ties to Syrian jihadists over the past five months. 

In a separate court session on Monday, Majdi Abu Nijm pleaded  not guilty to charges of “joining armed groups in Syria”.

In a session presided by Judge Ahmed Tarawneh, the 28-year-old Nijm denied joining the ranks of Islamist militants during a seven-month stay in Syria in 2013. 

Nijm, also known as “Abu Maria”, is known as a leading theologian among the Jordanian Salafist movement and reportedly served as a Sharia judge and cleric for the Syrian Islamic Liberation Front, one of several Islamist groups currently battling the formerly Al Qaeda-aligned Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), between March and October 2013.

If convicted, the Amman resident faces a five-year prison term.

The soft-spoken Nijm remained silent for the majority of the court session, speaking up only to enter his plea and later to criticise Islamist groups which have turned their arms onto former ally ISIL. 

“Anyone who rejects the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant rejects the establishment of an Islamic state… no true Muslim turns his gun on mujahideen!” Nijm declared as he was escorted out of the courtroom. 

Meanwhile, the court heard on Monday the latest defence witness in the ongoing trial of 11 young Jordanians charged with plotting a series of terrorist attacks targeting several Western diplomatic missions and shopping centres in Amman in 2012. 

The court heard the testimony of Abdul Latif Abdul Rahman, a 66-year-old Ruseifa resident and former landlord of Nidal Al Manaa, brother of Mahmoud Al Manaa, one of the defendants.

In his testimony, Abdul Rahman denied ever meeting or encountering Mahmoud at his rented Ruseifa flat, which was raided by police in October 2012.

Abdul Rahman confirmed that Nidal had rented the apartment for a period of six days prior to the raid, which yielded dozens of semi-automatic weapons and ammunition caches according to the charge sheet.

During the session, defence attorney Taher Nassar attempted to establish that Mahmoud had never entered his brother’s apartment, and that  “no one could have transferred such a large weapons stash” to the apartment during the first six days of Nidal’s stay in the flat.

Adjourning the session, the court agreed to resume hearing witness testimonies on March 24. 

Nidal is one of 11 defendants authorities arrested in October 2012 on charges of attempting to carry out terrorist attacks on Jordanian soil.

The defendants are accused of having ties to Al Qaeda in Iraq, now known as the ISIL, and of travelling to Syria to receive funding and training to target various sites across Amman.

In the initial charge sheet, security officials said the 11 men had received explosives and rockets from Syria to carry out the alleged attack, which was to coincide with the anniversary of the November 9, 2005 Amman hotel bombings.

The defendants, all between the ages of 19 and 22, deny any affiliation to Al Qaeda or other Islamist movements. 

According to family members, the accused had no prior connections to each other prior to their arrest.

ZARQA/MAFRAQ — Interior Minister Hussein Majali on Monday visited Syrian refugee camps across the Kingdom.

During a visit to the UAE-run Mreijeb Al Fhoud Refugee Camp in Zarqa, Majali said Jordan seeks to continue cooperating with the United Arab Emirates in dealing with the influx of Syrian refugees.

Hadi Al Kaabi, the relief team manager at the camp, said the 250-dunum facility is currently hosting 3,851 refugees, most of whom are women, children, people with disabilities and patients. 

The camp can host about 5,000 people, and contains handicraft and vocational training centres, clinics, a primary school and playgrounds, Kaabi added. 

Majali also visited the Azraq Refugee Camp and checked on preparations to open the facility. 

Established by the government and the UNHCR, the camp can host 55,000 refugees in its first phase, out of a total capacity of 130,000.

UNHCR representative Bernadette Castel noted that the camp area is about 15 square kilometres and will include various facilities. 

Majali also visited the 30-dunum Ribaa Al Sarhan facility, which is the first station that receives Syrian refugees, offering them food and medical treatment. It also includes a refugee registration office. 

During a visit to the Zaatari Refugee Camp in Mafraq, some 90km northeast of Amman, Majali was briefed on the latest development in the camp since its inauguration in July 2012 over an area of 19 dunums. 

Camp director Col. Zaher Abu Shihab said the facility currently hosts around 107,000 refugees, adding that it has two-shift schools with around 13,000 students, healthcare facilities and some 3,000 commercial outlets offering various services.

Abu Shihab added that the camp currently has 24,000 trailers, but more are needed to replace the tents.

AMMAN — HRH Princess Basma, president of the National Goodwill Campaign’s higher committee, on Monday paid a visit to the Jordan Engineers Association (JEA) and met with its president and members.

During the visit, Princess Basma stressed the need to further enhance the partnership between the campaign and the JEA, particularly in benefiting from the syndicate’s experience in the area of home renovations to serve underprivileged households.

She commended the association’s achievements in developing the profession and improving the capabilities of Jordanian engineers to become leaders in the region.

JEA President Abdullah Obeidat noted that a memorandum of understanding will be signed soon between the association and the goodwill campaign to set a framework for their partnership, especially in carrying out maintenance work on houses of underprivileged people.

Meanwhile, Jordanian Hashemite Fund for Human Development              (JOHUD) Deputy Executive Director Reem Zaben highlighted the National Goodwill Campaign’s accomplishments since its launch in 1991, noting that a total of 296,500 people have benefited from the campaign’s services so far.

Some 720 university students received educational assistance from the nationwide campaign in the year 2013/2014, while 107 individuals were presented with aid to establish their own income-generating projects during the same period.

In addition, the campaign supported 78 societies and presented urgent assistance to 11,683 families in the past year.

The campaign, implemented by JOHUD, also focuses on areas hit hard by the influx of Syrian refugees.

AMMAN — Jordan on Monday summoned Israeli charge d’affaires in Amman, protesting the shooting of a Jordanian judge by Israeli soldiers and asked for immediate investigation on the incident.

A Higher Judicial Council source told The Jordan Times that Raed Zuaiter, a judge at the Amman Court of First Instance, was killed at the Jordan River crossing point on Monday morning.

The source, who asked to remain unnamed, said that Zuaiter, 38, was not on leave and was expected at the office as usual Monday.

However, he noted that the Jordanian embassy in Israel is following up on the issue with Israeli authorities.

This was also confirmed by his father, Ala-Eddine Zuaiter, a former judge, who noted that he had no idea that his son was crossing border.

Despite several attempts by The Jordan Times to contact the Jordanian embassy in Tel Aviv, officials were not available to comment.

“I have no further information,” the father told The Jordan Times.

Reuters reported that the Israeli military said the man had tried to seize a soldier’s gun at the King Hussein Bridge — known to Israelis as Allenby Bridge — which spans the Jordan River, and that troops had then shot him.

Reactions

Minister of Foreign Affairs Nasser Judeh denounced the incident and informed the Israeli charge d’affaires in Amman that the government of Jordan expects a report about the incident and asked for an immediate investigation, the Jordan News Agency, Petra, reported.

The Palestinian Authority in the West Bank city of Ramallah condemned what it called the “shooting at close range” by Israeli troops. It demanded an investigation, as did Jordan.

Meanwhile, dozens of Jordanians gathered “spontaneously” near the Israeli embassy to protest the shooting and demand tough measures by the government.

Apparently, the gathering came as a response to social media calls, with some encouraging “attacking” the embassy building.

Some of the protesters tried to approach the embassy premises but they were barred by the Gendarmerie Forces, who arrested at least four people, including a woman, according to activists.

The protesters, who represented average people, along with political parties, chanted slogans demanding the cancellation of the peace treaty and closing down Israel’s diplomatic mission. 

Professional associations also condemned this action, including the Jordan Engineers Association and the Jordan Bar Association.   

Parliament ‘angry’

MPs on Monday expressed anger over the killing of Zuaiter, blaming Israel for the “heinous crime”.

The Palestine Committee in the Lower House issued on Monday a statement in which it condemned the incident, demanding the abolishment of the peace treaty with Israel and encouraged the government to expel the Israeli ambassador in Amman and call back the Jordanian envoy in Tel Aviv.

The committee recalled its previous decision when Israeli Knesset was trying to discuss a petition to deny Jordan’s right as custodian of the Islamic holy shrines in Jerusalem. 

The House Rights and Freedoms Committee chairperson, Rula Hroub, condemned, in a statement carried by Petra, the violent, illegal act targeting a Jordanian civilian. She also expressed her condolences to the Zuaiter family. 

Also on Monday, the Reform Bloc at the Lower House led by MP Mejhem Sqour issued a strongly-worded statement, demanding that the prosecutor general move quickly to file a case against the Israeli army.

In remarks to The Jordan Times, Veteran MP Khalil Atiyeh described the incident as “very serious” and vowed that lawmakers will exert “maximum pressure on the government to expel the Israeli ambassador from Amman”.

Relatives and friends

Relatives and friends of Zuaiter said he was a calm person and never harmed anyone.

Judge Muwafaq Obeidat said he worked with Zuaiter for three years and was respected by his colleagues.

“We also went together to university; he is a man with high morals, and did not harm anyone,” Obeidat said, noting that Zuaiter is an only son.

This was also echoed by Lawyer Samer Mallah, who noted that Zuaiter was one of the most respected judges and his killing was “a shock” for many.

According to his relatives, Zuaiter is a PhD holder in law and has two children; one of them was in hospital the day his father was killed.

One of his cousins told The Jordan Times later in the day that Zuaiter’s parents asked for his burial in Palestine. 

ZARQA — A 37-year-old man reportedly shot himself on Sunday while he was near his father’s tomb at Ruseifa cemetery, according to an official at the Ruseifa Police Department.

Police were informed that the body was found at the graveyard and investigations revealed that the man shot himself.

The body was transferred to the forensic department at Prince Feisal Hospital.

AMMAN — Saudi Arabia on Sunday praised Jordan’s role in dealing with various issues in the region, especially hosting Syrian refugees.

During a meeting with Lower House Speaker Atef Tarawneh, Saudi Ambassador in Amman Sami Bin Abdullah Al Saleh called for further international support to Jordan in its efforts to host the refugees.

Discussions also covered issues of mutual interest and the latest developments in the Middle East.

Also on Sunday, Tarawneh met with Norwegian Ambassador to Jordan Sissel Breie and discussed parliamentary cooperation.