Tens of Jordanian MPs have walked out of a parliamentary session over a contentious water-for-energy agreement with Israel and the United Arab Emirates.
After the withdrawal resulted in a loss of quorum, Speaker of the House of Representatives Abdel Karim al-Daghmi decided on Wednesday to postpone the session set to consider the deal to Monday.
Jordanian protestors gathered in front of the lower house of the Jordanian parliament in Amman earlier on Wednesday to demand that the pact be cancelled.
The demonstrators carried banners that read “Down with the agreements of shame with the Zionist entity” and “The water-for-energy deal is a new crime against the homeland and the citizens.”
In the presence of US climate envoy John Kerry, Jordan, Israel, and the United Arab Emirates signed the agreement last month. Feasibility studies are being conducted on the initiative.
Jordan would supply Israel with 600 megawatts of power generated by a solar project built by the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the first Persian Gulf Arab country to repair relations with Tel Aviv last year, in exchange for Israel providing Jordan with 200 million cubic metres of desalinated water.
Following the announcement of the agreement, Jordan was rocked by protests, with calls to cut ties with Tel Aviv and abandon the project.
Jordan signed a so-called peace treaty with Israel in 1994, but Jordanians are at odds with their government and refuse to normalise relations with the Israeli authority in any way.
Normalization is opposed by the vast majority of Arabs, who support the Palestinian cause.
