Jordan denies requesting freed prisoner Ahlam Tamimi's deportation

Jordan’s Speaker of Parliament, Ahmed Safadi, has denied reports claiming that authorities asked Ahlam Tamimi, a Jordanian former prisoner released from Israeli detention, to leave the country.

This follows a report by a local news agency, which cited a source stating that Jordan had requested Tamimi, who was convicted in Israel for a 2001 bombing that killed 15 people, to leave the country.

The source added that Jordanian authorities had contacted Hamas, to which Tamimi is affiliated, and informed them that she must leave the kingdom or she would be extradited to the US.

According to a report by the Jordanian website Madar Al Saa, Tamimi, who works at a research centre in Amman, did not report to work.

In 2017, the United States requested Tamimi’s extradition to face trial for her alleged role in planning the August 2001 suicide bombing at the Sbarro restaurant in Jerusalem. However, Jordan’s Court of Cassation, the highest judicial authority in the country, ruled against her extradition, citing the non-enforceability of the extradition treaty between Jordan and the United States.

Following the attack, which killed 15 people, including two American citizens, Tamimi was arrested by Israeli occupation authorities and sentenced to 16 life terms. However, she was released in 2011 as part of a prisoner exchange deal and has since resided in Amman.

In 2013, the US Department of Justice filed charges against Tamimi, but Jordan’s judiciary refused to extradite her, and the Jordanian parliament did not ratify the extradition treaty with the US.

In 2017, US authorities charged Tamimi with terrorism, and the FBI placed her on its list of most wanted terrorists.

READ: Jordan tells Hamas to find a country which will accept freed prisoner, or she will be sent to US