50 Dead in Jordan Blast, Suicide blast in Iraq kills 33, US warns N.Korea on Nukes...

[reeds]

Just a few of the Yahoo headlines today..Wasnt it you right wingers spewing crap about how this world is a much safer place with Bush in control? Come on now..we all know this world is NO safer at all..perhaps less safe...

[Drbio]

Does Bush have control of Jordan? I think I missed that constitutional amendment. So Bush is now responsible for the terroristic actions of others reeds? You are completely ignorant.

[Mavdog]

an interesting article from todays WSJ about the aftershocks of the Iraq invasion.
Instead of sowing the seeds of democracy, it may very well prove to be sowing the seeds of incresing violence.
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Trouble Next Door: In Jordan, Bombs Highlight Changes Wrought by War

Influx of Iraqis and Their Wealth Bring Growth and Tension To a Key American Ally
Worries at the Textile Plant
By JAY SOLOMON
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
November 10, 2005; Page A1

Yesterday's bombings of three luxury hotels in Jordan are just the latest sign that the instability stirred up in Iraq is transforming its strategically crucial next-door neighbor.

A flood of Iraqi refugees and their money have fueled an economic boom in this kingdom of about five million people. That's creating rapid growth but also fueling inflation and shortages, while exacerbating the country's yawning wealth gap. Meanwhile, sectarian tensions sparked by Saddam Hussein's toppling -- and anger over Jordan's support for the American effort -- have also laid the groundwork for terror.

It wasn't immediately clear who carried out the attacks on the hotels, which are frequented by Westerners in the heart of the prosperous downtown of Amman, Jordan's capital. The closely coordinated blasts killed nearly 60 people and wounded more than 100. Security officials said the violence bore the mark of al Qaeda, due to the sequencing of the attacks and the targeting of such Western establishments as the Grand Hyatt, Days Inn and Radisson. (See related article1.)

Yesterday's carnage marked the second time in three months that terrorists have struck inside Jordan. Jordanian security officials have said that the last attack, in August, was personally ordered by al Qaeda's commander in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a native of Jordan who has long called for the toppling of the country's monarchy.

The combustible mix of refugees, hot money and terror is part of a broader convulsion throughout the region, radiating out of Baghdad. President Bush talks about a new wind of democracy blowing through countries like Lebanon and Egypt. Critics worry that an unstable Iraq has become a training ground for global terrorists and is feeding a regional conflict between the Sunni and Shiite sects of Islam.


Less visibly, economic changes have also rippled through the countries that neighbor Iraq. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have fled to countries where they have extensive tribal, religious and cultural ties, particularly Syria and Jordan. A gusher of money has followed these exiles into these two countries.

Jordan is particularly important to the U.S. Sandwiched between Iraq and Israel, Jordan has long been a key U.S. ally in the region and is one of only two Arab countries to recognize Israel. Under King Abdullah II, Jordan has emerged as a key staging area for the reconstruction of Iraq, hosting the headquarters of many companies and aid groups that have pulled out because of safety concerns. The king has also worked closely with U.S. officials on Israeli-Palestinian issues.

Denizens of the Friends Barber Shop in Jabal al Taj, one of the poorer neighborhoods in Amman, said before yesterday's bombings that the economic resurgence fueled by Iraqi refugees is coming at a steep price. The refugees "are taking our jobs one way or another," said Rafaal Hanna Fasho, a 23-year-old tire salesman who spends many evenings in the barbershop complaining to friends about the fallout from the war across the border. "Expenses have increased 40%, 50% because of the influx," he added. "Even food is much more expensive."

Modern Jordan's fortunes have long been tied to Iraq's. Bereft of the oil and gas that's fueled other Middle East economies, Jordan's kings have played on tribal and religious ties with their northeastern neighbor to secure preferential trading terms and energy agreements.

Mr. Hussein gave oil to the kingdom in exchange for its political support during the eight-year Iran-Iraq war during the 1980s. Jordan then became the principal conduit of both legitimate and illicit supplies and funds into and out of Iraq after the international community imposed sanctions on Baghdad following the first Gulf War. A United Nations-sponsored report released last month also said billions of dollars in kickbacks paid to Mr. Hussein and his cronies over the past decade went through Jordanian banks.

Magnet for Iraqis

These longstanding economic ties have served as a magnet for Iraqis fleeing after Mr. Hussein's fall in 2003. Since the U.S. invasion in March of that year, Amman's population has grown by as much as a third. Jordan's economy grew at a nearly 8% annual rate in the first half of this year, double the pace before the war. The market capitalization of the Amman Stock Exchange has more than tripled to $37 billion in just two years. The telecommunications sector is recording double-digit growth, as evidenced by the new satellite dishes that mingle among Amman's slopes of white-rock homes and centuries-old mosques and churches.


Beyond the Iraqi turmoil, other forces are also changing Jordan. King Abdullah II and his advisers in recent years have been aggressively pursuing a package of economic measures designed to make Jordan a new economic model and financial center for the Middle East.

Under a plan developed with the International Monetary Fund, the government has sold off state-owned companies and sharply reduced tariffs. Newly developed free-trade zones, created in partnership with Israeli companies, have allowed Jordan to nearly double its export revenue to $4 billion last year from $1.9 billion in 2000. Jordan that year also became the first Arab country to sign a free-trade agreement with the U.S., a pact that the Bush administration has tried to turn into the basis of a broader Middle East Free Trade area.

"With or without the Iraqis, the economic reforms are important," says Bassem Awadallah, who served as Jordan's finance minister until March. "That's why you're seeing an acceleration of economic growth."

Many of the Iraqi refugees arrive under two-week visas. But they can gain permanent residency permits if they make large investments in Jordan, according to a government official. Among the exiles are two of Mr. Hussein's daughters, Rana and Raghad, and some of the former dictator's financial cohorts and Baath Party apparatchiks, who developed major business holdings under the former Iraqi regime.

Raghad, 36, has used Amman as a base to organize a defense team for her father's trial, though she's already fired a number of his top attorneys. She lives in the exclusive Abdoun enclave in the Jordanian capital where, according to acquaintances, she sends her five children to a top international school and shops at high-end boutiques. The two sisters also drive around town in BMWs, often with a number of security guards.

Talal Al Gaaod, 45, the scion of one of Iraq's most prominent business families, developed vast agriculture and property holdings during the 1980s and 1990s in Iraq. His hundreds of brothers and cousins were part of a much wider business empire that reached into Mr. Hussein's inner circle. The young Mr. Gaaod, a graduate of the University of Southern California expanded his own businesses across the Middle East, moving regularly through Amman, Beirut and Dubai.

When President Bush's advisers began talking up an invasion of Iraq, Mr. Gaaod says he began to cut his business holdings in Iraq substantially. "In some ways, I was hopeful that Iraq could emerge stronger" after the fall of Mr. Hussein, says Mr. Gaaod, a Sunni and a leader of the Dulaimi tribe based in the al-Anbar province. "But the whole occupation has been marked by incompetence." He says he stopped traveling to Baghdad in 2004.

Mr. Gaaod's Tabouk Group had plans to develop a pipeline linking Jordan to Iraq's oil fields, which the businessman hoped would serve as a vehicle to develop Anbar, the country's most restive province. Mr. Gaaod's company is also part of a consortium that's planning to develop a satellite news service for Iraq and seeks to develop cement and natural-gas businesses.

Today, the worsening security situation has forced Mr. Gaaod to concentrate most of his business on Jordan. Among his new holdings are stakes in Amman's Sheraton hotel and an executive apartment project being developed by Marriott International Inc. On the first floor of Tabouk Group's offices, wall-length maps detail the new Marjan shopping mall, which will include three underground parking lots, a food court and a supermarket.

Other Iraqi exiles describe developing double lives: living comfortably in Amman while running businesses back inside Iraq. Khalid Al-Shamari, a developer and anti-Hussein activist, contracted with the Iraqi government last year to build power stations and schools in Baghdad and Fallujah. To help fund these projects, he's continued developing real-estate projects in Jordan.

Traveling to Baghdad two weeks of every month, Mr. Shamari, 50, says he wears tribal robes and turbans in order to blend in with the locals, as opposed to the slacks and dress shirt he wore in a recent interview. He travels in a beat-up truck and stays in low-cost hotels. He steers clear of contacts with U.S. troops or businessmen because of the growing violence.

"You need to be among the people," says Mr. Shamari in his Amman apartment, where days earlier he spent more than $40,000 entertaining 500 guests at his daughter's wedding at the Four Seasons. It wasn't hit yesterday, but was near the hotels that were. Elite Jordanians often hold their weddings at Amman's finest hotels. One of yesterday's explosions occurred in a wedding hall where 300 Jordanians were celebrating.

Middle-class and poorer Iraqis have also sought a haven in Jordan. Many of these new arrivals are living in low-grade apartments and trying to support loved ones trapped back home. They're also filling low-salaried jobs in the construction and services sectors, which now form the backbone of the virtually unprecedented economic expansion here.

On a recent Sunday afternoon, 27-year-old Shaima Al-Abid and her mother, Amneh, strolled through a shopping district looking for mobile-phone cards. Ms. Abid said she and her mother have no way of earning a living inside Jordan without a work permit and that they're dependent on her father sending money from Iraq.

They worry, though, about their ability to survive back in Iraq where many young women are being killed by Islamic extremists for not adorning traditional Islamic headscarves. "It's getting so bad that people are starting to long for Saddam," says Ms. Abid, wearing casual Western slacks and a blouse three months after arriving in Amman. "At least then we could walk on the streets."

A Country Split

Benefiting from the exile infusion, the luxury hotels in Amman -- including those hit yesterday -- had seen business surge since the war began. High-end outlets selling everything from Humvees to Prada bags, meanwhile, have opened in the capital's glistening new malls and showrooms. Iraqi-owned sports clubs, offering tennis, racquetball and massage, are packed on the weekends.

But below the top tier, many of the businesses that have underpinned Jordan's economic growth are voicing concerns about the effects of the war. Already a country split between a Palestinian refugee population and fractious Bedouin tribes in the south, Jordan has struggled to maintain ethnic and class harmony. Many Jordanian nationals fear their companies will be roiled by the conflict next door and squeezed out by the influx of foreign businessmen.

Mohammed Turk runs textile factories in one of Jordan's Qualified Industrial Zones in cooperation with Israeli companies. In 2004, his company, PrimeFive Garment Manufacturing Co., registered record export sales of nearly $12 million, sending goods to such U.S. clothing manufacturers as Gap Inc. and Levi Strauss & Co.

This year, Mr. Turk says his export revenue has plunged, amid rising competition from low-cost Chinese and Egyptian competitors. Mr. Turk is also concerned that growing instability in the region will make foreign buyers less likely to place bets on Jordan.

"We have been affected by the war in Iraq in the past because buyers were concerned about buying from Jordan," says Mr. Turk. "Will it happen in the future? The possibility is very high."

The war in Iraq and influx from abroad have distorted the economy in other ways. U.S. authorities worry that Amman has become a money-laundering center for ill-gotten Iraqi wealth, potentially to the tune of billions of dollars. Jordan's second-largest bank, the Housing Bank for Trade and Finance, is having a record year, with earnings expected to more than double and deposits from Iraqi clients rising precipitously since before the war. But U.S. intelligence and Treasury officials frequently call its downtown Amman office, curious about certain large transfers.

At the same time, property prices and rents have more then tripled in many areas of the city, which is home to as much as half of Jordan's population. The government has been forced to significantly raise the costs of kerosene used in small generators for electricity, due to shrinking supplies of oil from Iraq. Traditionally, Mr. Hussein gave oil to Jordan free or at steep discounts.

Now the government is caught in a political bind over fuel prices. Efforts by King Abdullah's government to use state coffers to subsidize the costs of fuel have hit Amman's finances hard. Currently, the state's budget deficit stands at over 11% of gross domestic product, when foreign aid is excluded. So the government is being forced to allow the price of kerosene and other fuels to rise, even at the risk of social unrest.

Jordanian officials today say they're concerned about maintaining stability in this environment. Soaring prices have given rise to major riots in southern Jordan in recent years. And recent polls say that at least 80% of Jordan's population is against King Abdullah's support of the Iraq war. Yesterday's hotel explosions and the recent rocket attack by al Qaeda in Jordan's southern port of Aqaba, according to Jordanian security officials, are also raising concerns that the insurgency in Iraq is spilling across its borders.

Corrections & Amplifications: Jordan, located between Israel and Iraq, is not on the Persian Gulf. The initial version of this article incorrectly called Jordan a Persian Gulf kingdom.

[reeds]

"Does Bush have control of Jordan? I think I missed that constitutional amendment. So Bush is now responsible for the terroristic actions of others reeds? You are completely ignorant. "

No Bush doesnt have control of Jordan- nor the rest of the world for that matter- he just thinks he does.
Bottom line is this..the war with Iraq has done nothing for world peace-nothing positive anyway..You, Dude and the rest of the right have been preaching otherwise..

[Drbio]

Bush thinks he controls the world? Can you cite a quote please? Oh yeah...you cannot because he does not. That is completely inflamatory and ridiculous.

The war in Iraq has done nothing for world peace? Do the millions of repressed Iraqi's not count? Does the fact that Saddam had relationships with known terror groups that are now broken not count?

At least try to bring your A game reeds. Emotion-driven sensationalistic crap is all we are getting from you these days.

[FishForLunch]

If only Saddam was in power 9/11, Africa embassy bombings, Cole and Kobar tower bombing would never have happened. Liberals have their heads up their rear ends.

[reeds]

"Bush thinks he controls the world?"

Yes. I am thinking if you go invade another country without full backing from the rest of the world- you must feel you control the world? I would think anyway? If you invade a country and spend 250billion, 2000 of your own die, I would think you would know the reason for the invasion? Wasnt it weapons of mass destruction? Oh wait, that was ruled out. Didnt Bush demand the weapon inspectors leave immediately- althought they wanted more time? They wanted proof- and at that time they still had NOT uncovered any WMD...Hmmm..sure sounds like someone who thinks he can control the world. After all- the whole world was NOT behind bush.

[Drbio]

Originally posted by: reeds
"Bush thinks he controls the world?"

Yes. I am thinking if you go invade another country without full backing from the rest of the world- you must feel you control the world? I would think anyway? If you invade a country and spend 250billion, 2000 of your own die, I would think you would know the reason for the invasion? Wasnt it weapons of mass destruction? Oh wait, that was ruled out. Didnt Bush demand the weapon inspectors leave immediately- althought they wanted more time? They wanted proof- and at that time they still had NOT uncovered any WMD...Hmmm..sure sounds like someone who thinks he can control the world. After all- the whole world was NOT behind bush.

That's pretty convenient thinking for you. Ignorant thinking for everyone else. Do you still subscribe to the Global Test from your boy Kerry?

[Usually Lurkin]

I don't think we had full backing from the rest of the world when we invaded germany.



We didn't even ask Japan