Two Americans killed in Jordan police shooting

Jordanian news reports announced that two Americans and a South African contractor were killed by a former Jordanian police officer on Monday.

The gunman did not commit suicide as security sources earlier said.

He was identified as 28-year-old police Captain Anwar Abu Zeid.

The shooting, at a police training camp on the outskirts of the Jordanian capital, raises questions about Jordan’s image as an island of relative stability in a turbulent region.

Kirby said the two that were killed “were what we call monitors; they were contractors contracted through the State Department as trainer monitors for this curriculum”. They worked for DynCorp. The facility is now training police of various nationalities, including Palestinians and Lebanese, according to Al Ghad.

The site of the attack, a U.S.-funded facility, is used for training Palestinian security forces. It opened in 2003.

“We take this very seriously, and we’ll be working closely with the Jordanians to determine exactly what happened”, Obama said during remarks in the Oval Office with Israeli Prime Mininster Benjain Netanyahu. Jordan’s King Abdullah believes ISIL poses an existentialist threat to the kingdom. Jim Dresbach adapted it for Learning English.

Jordanian government spokesman Mohammed Momani told the Associated Press that an investigation had been launched into whether the motive for Monday’s shooting attack at the JIPTC was personal or political.

So far, no group has taken responsibility for the attack, which came on a grim anniversary in Jordanian history, coming 10 years to the day after a team of suicide bombers hit three hotels in Amman on November 9, 2005 in a killing spree that left about 60 dead and wounded over 100 others. Washington last month shifted policies to concentrate on assisting militiamen, including Syrian Kurds, who have experience battling the Islamic State.

The deadly incident raises concerns of a possible infiltration of the training programme by anti-American militants.

Jordan has also cracked down on anyone who waves Islamic State flags or expresses support for the group on the Internet.

The two Jordanian translators were to be buried later Tuesday and Wednesday.

Jordan is a staunch USA ally in the Washington-led campaign against Islamic State (IS) militants, who hold large areas of neighbouring Syria and Iraq, a position that leaves the kingdom vulnerable to jihadist attacks. More than half of the victims were Jordanians.

No members of the USA military at the training center were involved in the incident, according to CNN, which cited a US official.