Beleaguered Iran Developing Foothold in Jordan

Tehran seeks to bolster growing anti-Israeli sentiment in Jordan and the occupied West Bank

Last Friday, senior Jordanian and Israeli intelligence officials huddled in secret in Amman to coordinate efforts to prevent Iran from smuggling weapons and explosives into Jordan, Israeli counterterrorism officials told SpyTalk.

These officials said some of the arms have been making their way to Hamas militants in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. But they add that Jordanian King Abdullah II fears other Iranian weapons shipments are meant to add muscle to any future rebellion by the country’s majority population of Palestinians, who are incensed over the monarch’s overt security cooperation with Israel while its brutal war against their brethren in Gaza grinds on.

In late November Israeli officials dislayed what they said were weapons Iran supplied to militants in the West Bank (IDF spokesperson's unit)

In interviews, current and former U.S. and Israeli intelligence officials have concluded that despite the overthrow of Syria’s Bashar al-Assad regime and Israel’s decimation of both Hezbollah and Hamas, Iran has other proxies in the region to keep alive its so-called “axis of resistance” against Israel and the United States.

“Yes, it’s difficult, but Iran still has other assets that remain,” Norman Roule, a former senior CIA official, told SpyTalk.