‘Bring Malki’s killer to justice’

The parents of Malki Roth, an Australian girl murdered in a 2001 Palestinian bombing of a Jerusalem pizzeria, have presented a petition with almost 30,000 signatures to the US, demanding the extradition of terrorist Ahlam Tamimi from Jordan.

Arnold and Frimet Roth presented the petition to US ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee. It is addressed to President Donald Trump,  Attorney-General Pam Bondi and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, urging  diplomatic pressure on Jordan to extradite Tamimi, who masterminded the attack which claimed 16 lives and wounded more than 130 people.

Tamimi was captured, tried and sentenced to 16 consecutive life sentences in Israel, but was released in a 2011 prisoner swap to free abducted IDF soldier Gilad Shalit. She has been harboured by Jordan, where was acclaimed for the attack and expressed pride for it, becoming a celebrity TV host.

Pleas by Roth, who was raised in Australia, and his US-born wife Frimet for Tamimi to be extradited to the US, where courts have standing to try her, based on Malki’s American citizenship, have led nowhere.

In 2013, the US government filed criminal charges against Tamimi, who is on the FBI’s Most Wanted Terrorists list, for the murders of US nationals, including Malki, and four years later applied unsuccessfully for her extradition.