US embassy cable - 03AMMAN1053

C O N F I D E N T I A L AMMAN 001053 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/18/2013 
TAGS: PREL, PHUM, JO 
SUBJECT: JORDANIANS TAKE PART IN SIZABLE BUT SOGGY ANTI-WAR 
MARCH 
 
 
Classified By: AMBASSADOR EDWARD W. GNEHM.  REASONS 1.5(B) AND (D) 
 
1.  (SBU)  On Saturday, February 15, thousands of 
demonstrators 
participated in a 2 kilometer anti-war march through the 
Shmeisani 
district of Amman ending at the UN Headquarters there.  The 
demonstration, organized by the Higher Coordination Committee 
for 
Opposition Parties, was approved by the government and 
proceeded 
amidst a large and visible police presence.  Press estimates 
of 
crowd size ranged from 5,000 to 15,000 (with embassy security 
contacts 
reporting the actual size at between 3,000 to 5,000).  The 
crowd would presumably have been larger but for the cold and 
heavy 
rains which fell during the march.  There were no arrests and 
the demonstration 
ended peacefully. 
 
2.  (SBU)  The demonstrators chanted anti-war and anti-U.S. 
statements and carried banners such as "No blood for oil", 
"No to attacking Iraq" and "USA, where is your democracy". 
Many participants hoisted pictures of King Abdullah and 
Saddam Hussein along with 
Jordanian, Palestinian, Iraqi and Muslim Brotherhood flags. 
Islamic Action Front Secretary General Hamzeh 
Mansour addressed the crowd, indulging in explicitly 
anti-American 
rhetoric stating that Arab and world public opinion 
against a military strike was reaching the boiling point. 
 
3.  (C) COMMENT.  The march and rally were fully arranged in 
advance between the GOJ and the rally sponsors.  The rhetoric 
was sometimes heated and called on Arab leaders to refrain 
from 
assisting US or British forces in any military offensive. The 
tone of 
the rally and of local press reports and editorials boasted 
of a perceived 
tide of opposition to the war around the globe. 
 
4.  (C) Nevertheless, there is a seeming disconnect between 
the almost-universal opposition 
among Jordanians to war in Iraq and the modest size of the 
demonstration here.  Jordanian 
contacts lament the fact that demonstrations in European 
countries were larger, and 
that many were led by government officials reflecting the 
opposition of their people.  Some 
contacts attribute the low turnout to wariness among 
Jordanians about getting involved in an anti-war 
movement clearly not popular with the government; others to 
weariness from years of unnerving news from 
the West Bank and Iraq and to a pervasive sense that 
Jordanians have no power to influence the march to war. 
GNEHM