AMMAN, Jordan (AP) — Two Jordanians were killed and an Israeli was wounded by gunfire Sunday in a residential building in the heavily fortified Israeli embassy compound in Jordan’s capital, the kingdom’s Public Security Directorate said.

Before the shooting, Jordanians had entered the apartment building for carpentry work, the statement said.

It did not say what triggered the shooting.

Three people were initially wounded in the incident, the security agency said. Two Jordanians later died, according to the agency and the news site Hala Akhbar, linked to the Jordanian military.

One of the Jordanians killed was a physician at the scene, the security agency said.

The Israeli was in “unstable” condition, the new site said.

The Israeli Foreign Ministry had no comment.

The incident comes at a time of mounting tensions between Israel and the Muslim world over metal detectors Israel installed at a Jerusalem shrine revered by Muslims and Jews.

Jordan is the Muslim custodian of the site. On Friday, thousands of Jordanians staged an anti-Israeli protest in Amman.</s>Palestinian women pray at the Lion's Gate in Jerusalem on July 25, heeding a call from clerics to pray in the streets instead of inside the Al Aqsa Mosque compound until a dispute with Israel over security arrangements is settled.

—Once again, a cycle of deadly violence between Israelis and Palestinians – this time sparked by recent events at Jerusalem’s holiest of religious sites – poisoned already strained relations between the two populations and threatened to drag neighbors into the storm.

And once again the United States intervened.

As tensions spiraled and deaths related to the flare-up mounted, President Trump on Sunday – some say belatedly – dispatched his Middle East envoy Jason Greenblatt to Israel.

After meetings Monday with Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and into Tuesday, with a side trip to consult Jordan’s King Abdullah, Mr. Greenblatt was able to claim at least a role in an initial success, as Israel announced it was reversing new security measures on the Temple Mount/Haram Sharif site that had caused increasing outrage and protests around the Middle East.

Yet despite hopeful signs that steps addressing the current crisis may ease tensions, larger questions have bubbled up around the American mediation mission. Those include just how much leverage the US retains to stanch bloodletting and coax the parties back from the brink.

Moreover, Mr. Trump’s dispatching of his crisis envoy instead of bigger diplomatic guns – traditionally secretaries of State have been sent to broker crisis resolution deals, but in this case Rex Tillerson was nowhere in sight – has some region-honed diplomats and experts questioning the prospects of the president’s goal of an “ultimate deal” on Israeli-Palestinian peace.

“The president has talked a lot about achieving the ‘ultimate deal’ – but he’s delegated the work and details to people who simply don’t have the skills, experience, and credibility to put forward the kinds of new ideas that could speak to all the parties involved and help make progress,” says Haim Malka, deputy director of the Middle East Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington.

“This current crisis demonstrates the urgency of not letting things spiral out of control,” he adds, “but it’s hard to see real movement beyond immediate crisis management without higher-level [US] engagement.”

The wave of violence that claimed at least 10 lives and froze relations between the Israeli and Palestinian governments began early this month when Israel installed metal detectors at the entrance to the compound containing Jerusalem’s al-Aqsa Mosque – Islam’s third-holiest shrine – after three Arab Israelis shot and killed two Israeli guards at the site. The mosque is located on the Temple Mount, the holiest site in Judaism, venerated as the location of the two biblical temples.

Deadly demonstrations against Israel’s security measures ensued. On Friday a Palestinian who later said he was acting in protest against the measures at al-Aqsa invaded a home in a West Bank settlement and killed three family members eating the Sabbath meal.

Then on Sunday an Israeli guard at Israel’s diplomatic compound in Amman shot and killed two Jordanians after being attacked with a screwdriver by one of the Jordanians, who was delivering furniture to the diplomatic mission.

It was at this point, with the violence spreading to Jordan and threatening a wider crisis, that Trump dispatched Greenblatt to the region. Israeli officials also spoke by phone with Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and his designated Middle East dealmaker, but Mr. Kushner was obligated to remain in Washington to testify in Congress on his dealings with Russia during the presidential campaign.

Tensions began to ease early Tuesday after Jordan – in the hours following Greenblatt’s visit – allowed the Israeli Embassy guard to return to Israel with the rest of the embassy staff. Then in the early morning hours Israel dismantled the metal detectors at the gate leading to the mosque compound, pledging to replace them with high-tech cameras.

Officials claimed no quid-pro-quo deal was struck. But whatever led to the steps easing the crisis, some analysts say the resolution may say more about regional dynamics and politics than about enduring US clout in the Middle East.

“Even if you call this a non-deal deal, I think it was more likely driven by events on the ground than anything else,” says David Makovsky, director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy’s Project on the Middle East Peace Process.

Another key factor, he postulates, was Mr. Netanyahu’s consideration of this crisis in the context of Israel’s position in the region vis-à-vis increasingly friendly Sunni Arab regimes.

“Israel is very proud of its growing outreach with the Sunni states, and I just wonder if Netanyahu stepped back and decided, ‘Look, if this is not isolated, if I don’t solve this thing, this could really obstruct the inroads we’ve made with the Sunni Arabs and the Gulf states,’” says Mr. Makovsky, who from 2013-14 was a senior adviser on Israeli-Palestinian negotiations to Secretary of State John Kerry.

Along those same lines, others say Netanyahu may have had one eye on Turkey’s increasingly belligerent talk about the events at al-Aqsa Mosque, and may have been prompted by it to act quickly to head off Israel’s isolation.

“The Turks have been fanning the flames of this crisis, declaring that al-Aqsa is under siege, and it has looked to some like they are competing in a way with the Jordanians for influence in Jerusalem,” says CSIS’s Mr. Malka. “That trend is really worrying to the Israelis.”

Some Israeli analysts agree that Israel’s improving relations with Sunni states are critical to any progress towards peace – be it in resolving sudden crises or in pursuing an end to the decades-old Middle East conflict.

But some say the US, and the Trump administration’s emphasis on improving regional relations as key to an eventual comprehensive deal, are essential factors in any steps forward by the two principal parties.

“The US is very well-positioned right now to explore, with the involvement of Mr. Greenblatt, the commonalities between the moderate Sunni regimes and Israel, and to see where that can lead, not just in resolving crises but in achieving regional peace,” says Gilead Sher, director of the Center for Applied Negotiations at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv.

The argument that Trump should have sent in bigger guns to address the Temple Mount crisis holds little sway with Mr. Sher, who says that Greenblatt “has enough credibility and respect at this point to help restore order and get the parties back to talking.”

Others say the US retains incomparable clout in the region and for nudging along the peace process both because of and despite Trump’s unorthodox approach to diplomacy in the region.

“The good news is that the US has leverage because nobody wants to say ‘no’ to Trump, particularly because he is so unpredictable in what he’s going to do in response,” says the Washington Institute’s Makovsky. “The not-good news is that if the parties don’t have the requisite political will to square the circle – and neither side does right now – they will just say, ‘I didn’t say ‘no’ to Trump, the other side did,” he adds.

Where many analysts find common ground is in the assessment that Trump, if he really wants to achieve Mideast peace, will have to forego the idea of the all-at-once ultimate deal in favor of a long path of small steps to get there.

“The old approach on the basis of the formula that ‘nothing is agreed until everything is agreed’ has to give way to a continuous hands-on approach, with America leading a gradual process of interim agreements,” says Sher, who is co-chair of Blue White Future, a nonpartisan group that favors a two-state solution allowing survival of a “Jewish and democratic” Israel. “The new formula should be that whatever is agreed should be implemented.”

Makovsky says he is worried that “America’s standing in the region will be very seriously eroded if we try and fail for a fourth time to get the big deal all at once,” as Trump seems to want.

“Whenever it’s all or nothing in the Middle East, it’s always nothing, so I would say, ‘Don’t try to do the grand deal,’” Makovsky says. Instead, the baseball fan says the US should “stop trying to do the home run and instead go for a series of singles.”

The current crisis underscores the deep sensitivities on both sides concerning Jerusalem and its place in both peoples’ identity, so Makovsky says the US should not expect its “opening base hits” on that emotional issue.

But he says the “singles” should begin in areas that figure at the top of each side’s list: security for Israel and land issues for the Palestinians.

“People on both sides need to see that steps forward are possible, that there is a process,” Makovsky says. “But it’s really up to the leaders, more than any outside influence including the US, to show they can move the ball.”</s>JERUSALEM (Reuters) - The staff of Israel's embassy to Jordan, including a security guard involved in a shooting incident in which two Jordanians were killed, returned to Israel from Amman on Monday, an official from the Israeli prime minister's Office said.

Sunday's fatal shooting incident tested already tense relations between Israel and Jordan, one of two Arab states with which it has peace treaties. Jordan wanted to question the guard, who was slightly hurt, but Israel said he had diplomatic immunity and should be repatriated.</s>JERUSALEM >> A deadly shooting at Israel’s Embassy in Jordan further complicated Israeli government efforts on Monday to find a way out of an escalating crisis over Jerusalem’s most contested holy site, including mass Muslim prayer protests and Israeli-Palestinian violence.

The shooting, in which an Israeli security guard killed two Jordanians after being attacked by one of them with a screwdriver, has led to a diplomatic standoff between the two countries at a time when Jordan is heavily involved in efforts to defuse the crisis over the Jerusalem holy site. Jordan is the Muslim custodian of the shrine, which is also holy to Jews.

Jordanian officials said Monday that the guard could only leave if he first submitted to questioning, according to a news site linked to Jordan’s military. Israel insisted the guard has diplomatic immunity.

The drama played out as President Donald Trump’s Mideast envoy, Jason Greenblatt, headed to the Holy Land on Monday. It was the first sign of a high-level, on-the-ground attempt by the Trump administration to end the standoff between Israel and the Muslim world.

The escalation began earlier this month when Arab gunmen fired from the holy site, killing two Israeli policemen. In response, Israel installed metal detectors at the site, a move that incensed the Muslim world.

The shooting at Israel’s embassy in the Jordanian capital of Amman could further inflame Jordanian public opinion against Israel.

The Amman shooting took place on Sunday evening in a residential building used by the embassy staff.

Israel’s Foreign Ministry said the incident began when two Jordanian workmen arrived at the building to replace furniture. It said one of the workers, later identified as a 17-year-old of Palestinian origin, attacked an Israeli security guard with a screwdriver.

The guard opened fire, killing the teen. A second Jordanian, the owner of the building who was also a physician, was hit by gunfire and later died of his wounds. The guard was lightly hurt, the ministry said.

The Jordanian news site Hala Akhbar, which is linked to the kingdom’s military, quoted diplomatic and security officials as saying that Jordan refused to let the guard leave without an investigation.

The website quoted the officials as saying that Jordan might take “diplomatic measures” if Israel refuses to meet the demand.

Israel’s Foreign Ministry did not refer to Jordanian demands, but said the guard enjoys diplomatic immunity under international conventions.

An Israeli government official said talks were under way whether to evacuate the embassy staff, given the tensions in Jordan.

He said either all or none of the staff would be evacuated, and that the security guard would not be left behind. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the diplomatic efforts underway to defuse the situation.

The father of the teen killed in the shooting said Monday that he demands justice. Zakariah al-Jawawdeh told The Associated Press that his son Mohammed is a “son of Jordan who was shot on Jordanian soil” and it would be unacceptable for the government not to investigate the incident.

Israel’s security Cabinet met from late Sunday until the early hours of Monday to discuss the crisis at the shrine and the embassy shooting, and was to convene again Monday afternoon.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke by phone to Israel’s ambassador in Jordan, Eynat Schleyn, and to the security guard.

Israel and Jordan signed a peace deal in 1994, but the agreement remains deeply unpopular in the kingdom where many residents are of Palestinian origin. Jordan and Israel have close security ties, but frequently clash over Israeli policies at the Jerusalem shrine.

Jordan’s ruling Hashemite dynasty, said to trace its ancestry to the Prophet Muhammad, draws much of its legitimacy from its role as protector of the shrine.

Meanwhile, the security Cabinet reached no decision after a six-hour meeting on how to defuse the crisis over the Jerusalem shrine, Israeli media said. The ministers were reportedly reviewing the initial decision on installing the metal detectors and weighing possible alternatives.

Israel has said the metal detectors were a needed security measure to prevent future attacks. However, the government is facing growing domestic criticism, with some commentators saying it did not fully weigh all the repercussions of introducing new measures at the most volatile spot of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Muslim religious leaders have alleged that Israel is trying to expand its control at the site under the guise of security — a claim Israel denies. The tensions have led to mass prayer protests and deadly Israeli-Palestinian violence.

Ikrema Sabri, a senior Muslim cleric, said Monday that Jerusalem’s police chief, Yoram Halevi, met a day earlier with a lawyer representing the Muslim leadership to discuss solutions to the crisis.

Sabri said newly installed security cameras, described in media reports as a possible alternative to the metal detectors, were discussed.

He said the lawyer was to brief the Muslim leadership later Monday on Israel’s responses.

The 37-acre walled compound is the third holiest site of Islam, after Mecca and Medina in Saudi Arabia. It is also the holiest site of Judaism, revered as the place where biblical Temples once stood.

Laub reported from Jericho, West Bank. Associated Press Writer Mohammed Daraghmeh in Ramallah, West Bank, and Omar Akour in Amman, Jordan, contributed to this report.</s>25 July, Jerusalem: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday that an Israeli security guard who shot dead two Jordanians after being stabbed outside Israel’s embassy in Jordan will be brought home to Israel.

In a statement released by the Prime Minister’s Office, Netanyahu said he called the guard over the phone and promised him that Israel “has experience in dealing with such situation” and would “bring him home.”

The guard opened fire after he was stabbed with a screwdriver outside the Israeli embassy in Amman on Sunday night.

Local media reported that Jordanian authorities refuse to allow the guard to leave the country before he is investigated. The father of the stabber said he demands justice for his son’s death.

Some 30 Israeli workers are still inside the embassy, according to Israeli media reports.

At noon, “a senior military official” was en route to Amman to help solve the diplomatic crisis, reports said.

 The incident further complicated efforts to resolve a spiraling crisis over Al-Aqsa mosque compound, East Jerusalem’s most sensitive holy site. Xinhua</s>Israel on Monday said an Israeli security guard at its embassy compound in the Jordanian capital, Amman, shot and killed two Jordanians after one attacked the guard with a screwdriver, an incident likely to widen a diplomatic rift between the two key U.S. allies.</s>JERUSALEM (AP) — Israel’s Foreign Ministry has provided its first details of a shooting at Israel’s embassy in Jordan, saying a security guard shot and killed two Jordanians in a confrontation.

The shooting took place Sunday evening in a residential building used by embassy staff.

The ministry says two Jordanian workmen entered the building to replace furniture. One of the workers attacked an Israeli guard with a screwdriver. Israeli media say the guard opened fire, killing the 17-year-old Jordanian. The reports say the Jordanian owner of the apartment was hit by gunfire inadvertently and later died.

The media reports say Jordan demands to conduct an investigation, and that embassy staff remain inside the embassy.

The Israeli statement said that according to international conventions, the guard has legal immunity.</s>JERUSALEM - Israel installed new security cameras Sunday at the entrance to a sensitive Jerusalem holy site, as officials began indicating it was considering "alternatives" to the metal detectors at the contested shrine that set off a weekend of violence and raised tensions in the region.

Israel set up the new security measures last week after Arab gunmen opened fire from the shrine, killing two Israeli policemen. It said they were a necessary measure to prevent more attacks and were deployed routinely at holy sites around the world. But Muslims alleged Israel was trying to expand its control at the Muslim-administered site and have launched mass prayer protests.

Three Palestinians were killed in street clashes Friday in some of the worst street violence in years, and later a Palestinian stabbed to death three members of an Israeli family.

Maj. Gen. Yoav Mordechai, who heads the Israeli defense body for Palestinian civilian affairs, said Israel was open to alternatives to lower the tensions.

"The only thing we want is to ensure no one can enter with weapons again and carry out another attack," he said. "We're willing to examine alternatives to the metal detectors as long as the solution of alternative ensures the prevention of the next attack."

However, the Mufti of Jerusalem, Sheikh Muhammad Hussein, told the Voice of Palestine he demands a complete return to procedures that were in place before the initial attack at the shrine, known to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary and to Jews as the Temple Mount.

In a statement Sunday, the Islamic institutions in Jerusalem, of which he is a part, said they "affirm the categorical rejection of the electronic gates and all the measures of occupation."

Disputes over the shrine, revered by Muslims and Jews, have set off major rounds of Israeli-Palestinian confrontations in the past.

On Friday, several thousand Palestinians clashed with Israeli security forces in the West Bank and in Jerusalem after noon prayers — the centerpiece of the Muslim religious week. Three Palestinians were killed and several dozen wounded after protesters burned tires and threw stones and firecrackers. Israeli troops responded with live rounds, rubber bullets and tear gas.

Late Friday night, a 20-year-old Palestinian identified as Omar al-Abed jumped over the fence of the Halamish settlement near Ramallah and entered a home, surprising a family that was celebrating the birth of a new grandchild during their traditional Sabbath dinner. He stabbed to death Yosef Salomon, 70, and his adult children, 46-year-old Chaya and 35-year-old Elad. A neighbor, an off-duty soldier, heard the screams, rushed to the home and opened fire, wounding the attacker. TV footage showed the floor tiles drenched in blood, and officials called it a "slaughter."

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu denounced the attack as "an act of terror, carried out by a beast who was incited with unfathomable hatred."

At his weekly Cabinet meeting, Netanyahu vowed the killer's home would be demolished swiftly in retribution and those who incited and glorified his act would be dealt with.

"Since the beginning of the events I've conducted a series of meetings and evaluations with the all the security officials, including those on the ground. We receive updates on the ground from them and recommendations on how to act and we decide accordingly," he said.

Israel has repeatedly accused the Palestinian Authority of permitting anti-Israeli incitement in the public Palestinian discourse and vowed to act against it. The Palestinians reject the allegations, saying Israel's 50-year-old occupation of lands sought for a Palestinian state is at the root of widespread Palestinian anger and helps drive violence.

Israel has yet to comment on the new cameras and whether they offered a chance to restore calm. A top adviser to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said he was holding consultations with various countries, including Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Morocco, about the crisis.

The assailant said in a pre-attack Facebook post that he expected to be killed in the attack and his father said he was motivated by the violence at the Jerusalem shrine, which in a rare move was briefly shut down last week after the shooting attack.

The site is administered by Muslim authorities under the auspices of Jordan but Israel maintains security control of the compound.

Anticipating a demolition, local residents in the village of Kobar said the family emptied its home of valuables Saturday. Later, clashes erupted as residents burned tires and hurled rocks at Israeli troops who had searched the home. The military said about 50 people attacked troops who fired back with rubber bullets and tear gas. Low-level clashes took place elsewhere throughout the day.

Israel fortified its troops in the West Bank and placed forces on high alert after the attack. The Israeli military said it carried out a wave of overnight arrests of 25 people, including 20 members of the Islamic Hamas militant group.

Gaza's Hamas rulers praised the attack, but stopped short of taking responsibility for it.</s>A top aide to US President Donald Trump was due in Israel Monday in a bid to ease tensions over new security measures at a highly sensitive Jerusalem holy site after a weekend of deadly violence.

Jason Greenblatt's visit comes after more than a week of tensions over the Haram al-Sharif mosque compound, known to Jews as the Temple Mount and central to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Israel installed metal detectors at entrances to the site, which includes Al-Aqsa mosque and the Dome of the Rock, following an attack on July 14 that killed two policemen.

Palestinians view the move as Israel asserting further control over the site. They have refused to enter the compound in protest and have prayed in the streets outside.

Israeli authorities say the metal detectors are needed because the July 14 attackers smuggled guns into the site and emerged from it to shoot the officers.

Clashes have broken out during protests over the measures, leaving five Palestinians dead.

On Friday, a Palestinian broke into a home in a Jewish settlement in the occupied West Bank and stabbed three Israelis to death.

An incident on Sunday night in Amman that, according to Israeli officials, saw a Jordanian attack an Israeli security guard with a screwdriver at the Israeli embassy compound raised further concerns, though it was not immediately clear if there was any link.

The security guard was said to have shot dead the Jordanian, while a second Jordanian there at the time was also killed.

Separately on Monday, Israeli tank fire struck a Hamas post in the Gaza Strip after what was believed to be a rocket from the enclave landed in an open area in Israel.

With fears further unrest could follow, Greenblatt "departed for Israel last night to support efforts to reduce tensions in the region," a US official said on condition of anonymity.

The UN Security Council will also hold closed-door talks Monday about the spiralling violence after Egypt, France and Sweden sought a meeting to "urgently discuss how calls for de-escalation in Jerusalem can be supported".

Israeli officials have signalled they may be open to changing the measures at the holy site. Cameras have been installed at entrances in a possible indication of an alternative to the metal detectors.

"Since the start of the events, I have held a series of assessments with security elements including those in the field," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Sunday.

"We are receiving from them an up-to-date picture of the situation, as well as recommendations for action, and we will decide accordingly."

Arab League chief Ahmed Abul Gheit on Sunday accused Israel of "playing with fire" with the new security measures, and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan called them an insult to the Muslim world.

Pope Francis said he was following events with concern and urged dialogue and moderation.

Friday's main weekly Muslim prayers -- which typically draw thousands to Al-Aqsa -- brought the situation to a boil.

In anticipation of protests, Israel barred men under 50 from entering the Old City for prayers.

Clashes broke out between Israeli security forces and Palestinians around the Old City, in other parts of annexed east Jerusalem and in the occupied West Bank, leaving three Palestinians dead.

They continued on Saturday, leaving two more Palestinians dead, including one when a petrol bomb exploded prematurely. More scuffles broke out around Jerusalem's Old City on Sunday night.

Friday evening also saw a Palestinian break into a home in a Jewish settlement in the West Bank during a Sabbath dinner and stab four Israelis, killing three.

The Israeli army said the 19-year-old Palestinian had spoken in a Facebook post of the holy site and of dying as a martyr.

The holy site in Jerusalem has served as a rallying cry for Palestinians.

In 2000, then Israeli opposition leader Ariel Sharon's visit to the compound helped ignite the second Palestinian intifada, or uprising, which lasted more than four years.

It is in east Jerusalem, seized by Israel in the 1967 Six-Day War and later annexed in a move never recognised by the international community.

Considered the third holiest site in Islam, it is the most sacred for Jews.</s>Two Jordanians have been killed and one Israeli wounded in a shooting incident in a building within

A police statement says two Jordanian men working for a furniture firm had entered the embassy before the shooting.

The dead Jordanian was killed by a gunshot, while the two wounded people including an Israeli were taken to hospital.

Jordanian officials have called on Israel to remove metal detectors outside the Al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem.

The mosque’s installation has triggered the bloodiest clashes with Palestinians in years.

Jordan shooting : Two killed, one wounded at Israeli embassy
Israel's embassy staff in Jordan, including a security guard involved in a shooting incident in which two Jordanians were killed yesterday, return to Israel from Amman. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu thanked U.S. President Donald Trump and Jordan's King Abdullah for their help and cooperation.