Jordan seems united in cry for action against Islamic State

In its first military response to the Islamic State’s killing of its pilot, Jordan said Thursday it had sent dozens of F-16 aircraft to attack Islamic State targets in Syria, possibly its biggest intervention so far in the war.

But for many Jordanians it was way short of what’s needed to avenge the Islamic State’s act of burning Lt. Muath al-Kaseasbeh alive, and then broadcasting it to the world in a video.

If interviews of 20 people in Jordan’s two biggest cities is a predictor, citizens of all backgrounds and ages hope for an all-out war that will result in the total defeat of the extremist group. And they’d like the United States to send ground troops in to finish the job but doubt that support will be forthcoming.

“We should smash them into the ground,” said Abu Majid, 56, who manages a sewing machine store in Zarqa, a city of 800,000 whose claim to fame includes being the birthplace of the founder of al-Qaida in Iraq, the precursor to the Islamic State. Like most interviewed for this story he didn’t want his full name used and instead used the Arabic word “Abu,” which means “father of.”

It would be “an honor to fight those people,” he said. “We should use our ground and air forces. The United States should support us, but in our situation, we should not wait for help from anyone.”

His condemnation suggested that Jordan’s King Abdullah II, who Thursday met the family of the deceased pilot, even as air force jets flew overhead, could have a major challenge fulfilling the expectations of this nation of 6 million. Abdullah promised Wednesday to “hit hard at the very center” of the Islamists’ strongholds.

Jordan’s military, totaling 105,000, is well trained, according to the annual “Military Balance” report of the International Institute of Strategic Studies in Britain. On paper, Jordan has a 3-to-1 manpower advantage over the Islamic State, should Abdullah send ground troops.

Not everyone thinks that’s a good idea. “I think the Jordanians are at risk of overreacting and making choices that cause it greater troubles down the road,” said Ramzy Mardini, a nonresident fellow at the Atlantic Council, a Washington think tank.

Zarqa, a hardscrabble, dusty city of potholed roads, run-down housing and high unemployment, is the hometown of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the founder of al-Qaida in Iraq, which later changed its name to the Islamic State. In random interviews with a dozen people, no one spoke positively of him, and most said they knew nothing beyond media reports that U.S. forces shot him dead in 2006.

Whatever sympathy the Islamic State once enjoyed is apparently over, however. Just one month ago, many Jordanians were happy that there was an Islamic State, Abu Majid said. But after the beheadings of two Japanese and the burning alive the Jordanian pilot, “We pray to God to kill them, to banish them from the Earth,” he said.

This story was originally published February 5, 2015 at 8:00 PM with the headline "Jordan seems united in cry for action against Islamic State."