Jordan refuses to bury freed prisoner who died of cancer, Islamic Jihad says

The Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror group says Jordan has refused to receive the body of Moatassem Radad, a Palestinian prisoner of Jordanian origin who was released in a hostage deal earlier this year and died of cancer in an Egyptian hospital last week.

The group said it had intended to transfer the body to Jordan so he could be buried alongside his family. According to their statement, Jordanian authorities returned the body to Egypt after it had already been flown to the airport in Amman, Jordan’s capital.

Jordan has in the past refused to accept prisoners released by Israel in exchange for hostages held in Gaza who were deported to Egypt, even those holding Jordanian citizenship.

Radad was a member of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad and was sentenced in Israel to 20 years in prison for security offenses, though the specific charges were not published in Israel. He was originally from the village of Sida in the western West Bank, though part of his family is originally from Jordan. He was hospitalized in Egypt.