STRASBOURG: Jordan’s King Abdullah II warned in an address to the European Parliament on Tuesday that Israel’s “attacks” on Iran threatened to dangerously escalate tensions in the “region and beyond”.
Speaking as the arch foes traded fire for a fifth day, Abdullah said that “with Israel’s expansion of its offensive to include Iran, there is no telling where the boundaries of this battleground will end”.
“And that, my friends, is a threat to people everywhere,“ he told lawmakers in Strasbourg.
Israel says its air campaign aims to prevent its sworn enemy from acquiring nuclear weapons, an ambition Tehran denies.
The escalation -- capping decades of enmity that has spiked with the war in Gaza -- has derailed nuclear talks with Iran and stoked fears of a broader conflict.
Abdullah addressed lawmakers at length on the “shameful” situation in Gaza, urging the international community to keep pressing for a resolution to the eight-decade Israeli-Palestinian conflict as critical to “our mutual security”.
“What version of our humanity allows the unthinkable to become routine, permits weaponising famine against children, normalises the targeting of health workers, journalists and civilians seeking refuge in camps,“ he asked.
“This conflict must end, and the only viable solution is one grounded in a just peace, international law and mutual recognition.”
Israel has pounded most of Gaza into rubble following Hamas’s attack of October 7, 2023. The death toll in the Palestinian territory has surpassed 55,000 people, the majority of them civilians.
