Around 200 Jordanian students gathered near the Israeli embassy in west Amman to mark the “nakba” or “catastrophe” of the 1948 creation of the Jewish state, vowing to later march on the border.
“The people want to liberate Palestine. We are ready to die for Jerusalem. The right of return is sacred,” the young demonstrators chanted outside Al-Kaluti mosque, calling for the embassy to be closed.
Waving Jordanian and Palestinian flags, the students sang national songs and carried banners reading “Palestine is Arab. Together we will return.”
The group, calling themselves “the May 15 Youths,” said on their Facebook page that would march on the border with Israel, a day after police prevented them from making an earlier attempt.
After their protest in Amman they planned to take buses to the Israeli border, they said.
On Friday, 10,000 people gathered in the Jordan Valley town of Karemeh to mark nakba, while 700 marched through the city centre chanting “Palestine, Palestine, the refugees promise to return to you!”
Jordan, where nearly half the 6.3 million population is of Palestinian origin, signed a peace treaty with Israel in 1994. - Sapa-AFP