Western media make much of crimes allegedly committed by Israel against Palestinians. Yet when Arab regimes torture or kill Palestinians, or when armies and militias in war-torn Syria slaughter them by the hundreds, the response is largely silence—including on the part of the Palestinian Authority. Khaled Abu Toameh writes:

[A]ccording to a report published this week by the Working Group for Palestinians in Syria, 2,596 Palestinians have been killed since the beginning of the conflict in that country in 2011. But this is a news item that has hardly found its way into mainstream media in the West. Even Arab media outlets have almost entirely ignored the report. . . .

The reason for this apathy, of course, is clear. The Palestinians in Syria were killed by Arabs and not as a result of the conflict with Israel. Journalists covering the Middle East do not believe that this is an important story because of the absence of any Israeli role in the killings. . . .

That Palestinians are being killed by Arabs does not seem to bother even the Palestinian Authority, whose leaders are busy these days threatening to file “war crimes” charges against Israel with the International Criminal Court. As far as the Palestinian Authority is concerned—and the media, the EU, the UN, and human-rights groups—the only “war crimes” are being committed by Israelis.

Last week, Jordanian police arrested sixteen members of the country’s branch of the Muslim Brotherhood for acquiring explosives, trying to manufacture drones, and planning rocket attacks. The cell was likely working in coordination with Hamas (the Palestinian offshoot of the Brotherhood) and Hizballah, and perhaps receiving funding from Iran. Ghaith al-Omari provides some background:

The Brotherhood has been active in Jordan since the 1940s, and its relations with the government remained largely cooperative for decades even as other political parties were banned in the 1950s. In exchange, the Brotherhood usually (but not always) supported the palace’s foreign policy and security measures, particularly against Communist and socialist parties.

Relations became more adversarial near the turn of the century after the Brotherhood vociferously opposed the 1994 peace treaty with Israel. The Arab Spring movement that emerged in 2011 saw further deterioration. Unlike other states in the region, however, Jordan did not completely crack down on the MB, instead seeking to limit its influence.

Yet the current Gaza war has seen another escalation, with the MB repeatedly accusing the government of cooperating with Israel and not doing enough to support the Palestinians.

Jordanian security circles are particularly worried about the MB’s vocal wartime identification with Hamas, an organization that was considered such a grave security threat that it was expelled from the kingdom in 1999. The sentiment among many Jordanian officials is that the previous lenient approach failed to change the MB’s behavior, emboldening the group instead.