In her first public appearance since the war between Israel and Hamas broke out in early October, Jordan’s Rania criticized in an interview the “double standards” of Western countries in their support for the Israeli Army’s bombings in the Gaza Strip. . “People across the Middle East, including Jordan, are shocked and disappointed by the global reaction to this unfolding catastrophe. In recent weeks we have seen a blatant double standard in the world,” Rania said in an exclusive interview on the CNN station. The monarch focused on the humanitarian issue in Gaza, where Israeli bombings have caused the death of 6,546 civilians, including 2,704 children, according to data from the Gaza Ministry of Health. “This is the first time in modern history that there is such human suffering and the world is not even calling for a ceasefire,” Rania said. “The deafening silence, for many in our region, makes the Western world complicit,” she added.
Jordan maintains a stable relationship with Israel since recognizing the state in 1994. However, after Israel declared a “complete siege” of Gaza, Amman has become one of the most critical voices in the region, calling for an end to hostilities for fear of a large displacement of the Palestinian population. King Abdullah of Jordan has reiterated that the resettlement of Palestinian refugees to Jordan and Egypt is “a red line” and that he is not willing to accept displaced populations, for fear that they will not be able to return to the Palestinian territories, as has happened with wars. previous. Rania denounced that the Palestinian territories live under an “apartheid regime” as international organizations have pointed out. “Basically, they are given a choice between expulsion or extermination, between ethnic cleansing and genocide. No people should be given, no people should face this kind of choice,” he said. “The people of Gaza should not be forced to be relocated again,” he said, referring to the presence in the Strip of Palestinian refugees from other territories, who have been forced by Israel to move to the south of the territory, given the imminent Army ground raid.
Rania of Jordan echoed the words of her husband, who noted at a summit last week that the lives of Palestinians and Arabs in the region “they matter less than the Israelis” for Western countries. “When October 7 happened, the world immediately sided with Israel and its right to defend itself and condemned the attack,” he said, alluding to Hamas’ surprise offensive in Israel, which caused the death of 1,400 Israelis. . And he added: “But what we are seeing in the last two weeks… we are seeing the silence of the world,” he denounced. The monarch influenced the Israeli bombings, which have caused the death of “children, doctors, UN workers, journalists.” “They are telling us that it is wrong to kill a family at gunpoint, but that it is right to bomb them to death,” he lamented, after describing the situation of many families in Gaza, who write the names of their children on their bodies so that can be identified if they die in a bombing. “As a mother, I want to remind the world that Palestinian mothers love their children as much as any other mother in the world,” described the queen of Jordan, who is also of Palestinian origin.
During the interview, CNN asked him if he condemned the Hamas attacks. Rania condemned the killing of civilians, but questioned the support of some governments for Israel to defend itself, while the Palestinians’ right to resistance is criticized. “One is an occupier, the other is an occupied, one has an army, one of the most powerful armies in the world. The other has no army. This is how this false symmetry is drawn,” he described. The Queen of Jordan recalled that the Israeli State has violated “thirty UN security resolutions” that demand that it “withdraw from the occupied territories of 1967”, referring to the West Bank and East Jerusalem.