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July 24, 2017 4:23 pm
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After Day of High Diplomatic Tension, Staff of Israeli Embassy in Jordan Returns Home Safely to Jewish State

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The Allenby Bridge, a main crossing point between Israel and Jordan. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.

After a day of intense diplomacy, the staff of the Israeli Embassy in Amman — including the security guard who was lightly wounded in an incident near the compound on Sunday — returned home safely to the Jewish state on Monday.

According to media reports, the group — led by Israeli Ambassador to Jordan Einat Shlain — crossed the Allenby Bridge some time before 11 p.m. (Israel time) on Monday night.

Monday saw top-level contacts between the Israeli and Jordanian governments — including a phone call between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and King Abdullah II and a visit to the Jordanian capital by Shin Bet chief Nadav Argaman — as the two sides sought to resolve the crisis that erupted a day earlier when the guard shot two Jordanians dead after he was assaulted with a screwdriver by one of them.

Immediately following the incident, Jordanian authorities refused to let the guard leave for Israel and sought to question him. On Monday, the guard provided Jordanian officials with testimony about what transpired.

As of the time of publication, the full details of the deal that enabled the guard’s departure on Monday night were unclear.

Tensions had already been running high between Israel and Jordan since Israel put metal detectors in place at the entrances to the Temple Mount in Jerusalem last week following the July 14 terrorist attack there in which two Israeli policemen were killed.

Jordan funds the Jerusalem Islamic Waqf, which administers the Muslim holy sites on the Temple Mount. The Hashemite kingdom ruled East Jerusalem — including the Old City, where the Temple Mount is located — between 1948 and 1967.

Israel and Jordan signed a peace treaty in 1994.

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