Jordan's services to US control of Middle East

An article about the center for training police for the Middle East in Jordan. US officers train police for Iraq, for instance. Also, police are trained to support Fatah against Hamas, showing that Fatah collaborates with the US and Israel to implement US goals in Palestine.

Since graduating its first class in November 2003, JIPTC has trained more than 50,000 police officers bound for Iraq. The academy has trained four battalions of the Palestinian security forces, deployed under the auspices of US security coordinator, General Keith Dayton, to back the "caretaker" Palestinian government of Mahmoud Abbas and Salam Fayyad in the West Bank.

With little fanfare, JIPTC has Jordan's regime playing a frontline role in the US project to transform the Middle East.

"Jordan continues to be a key partner and to play a positive role in the region," General David Petraeus, the US commander responsible for the region, told a Senate Armed Service Committee meeting in April.

"Jordan participates in many regional security initiatives and has placed itself at the forefront of police and military training for regional security forces."

The Palestinian forces have an open agenda to target Hamas and other Palestinian factions. In May, six people were killed when Dayton's forces attacked Hamas activists in the West Bank town of Qalqilya, sparking a gun battle that lasted several hours and took place without Israel's interference.

Hamas characterized the attack as "an awful crime" committed by "collaborators", while Abbas declared that his forces would continue to strike opposition groups "with an iron fist".

Dayton, in his only major policy speech to date, told the stridently pro-Israel think-tank, The Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP), that JIPTC-trained Palestinian security forces had engaged in a series of violent raids that were "surprisingly well coordinated" with Israel. Dayton characterized the results as "electric".

"They have caught the attention of the Israeli defense establishment for their dedication, discipline, motivation and results," Dayton said. "The Jordanian-trained guys are the key."

To this end, Dayton told the WINEP audience: "You might ask, why Jordan? The answer is pretty simple. The Palestinians wanted to train in the region, but they wanted to be away from clan, family and political influences. The Israelis trust the Jordanians, and the Jordanians were anxious to help."