Jordanian opposition groups fear anti-Iranian backlash

Al-Hayat prints an interesting report on the dilemma faced by Jordanian opposition parties and professional groups, focusing in particular on the Muslim Brotherhood. The dilemma is this: While the opposition has traditionally been friendly with Iran, with the handling of the Saddam execution, in the words of an unidentified opposition person, "the Safavid project in Iraq has become clear, and it is a threat to the security of Iraq and to its unity." An official of the Muslim Brotherhood explained to the reporter this puts the group between a rock and a hard place, because "The execution of Saddam in this way ...offends every religions and moral value, but right now we can't talk about this issue publicly because we fear it could be exploited in a sectarian way, or used by the Americans in their fight with Iran".

The MB official said his group just a couple of weeks ago presented to Iran via the Amman embassy a proposal for establishing "a true Islamic orientation in Iraq, eliminating any kind of sectarianism", and the group hopes to talk to Iranian officials in the coming days about that and the dilemma they face as a result of the Saddam exeution.

They fear not only that anti-Iranian polarization will take over the whole Iraqi political scene, but also that these feelings could ignite trouble in Jordan. Already there have been street expressions of enmity toward Iraqi Shiite politicians including Abdulaziz al-Hakim and Moqtada al-Sadr, and the fear is that if this situation festers, this could be turned against Shiite Jordanians.

This is a short piece, indicating only the broad picture, without details of the demonstrations and statements and so on that have been going on in Jordan in the last few days. It is headed: "Jordan: The execution of Saddam has turned popular feeling against Iran, and the Islamists fear their position could be used in the service of America".