Jordan on Wednesday distanced itself from a minister's remarks that a convicted killer of seven Israeli schoolgirls was a "hero," saying the official was expressing his "personal views."
"The statement of Justice Minister Hussein Mujalli does not represent the Jordanian government's official position at all," foreign ministry spokesman Mohammad Kayed told the state-run Petra news agency.
"It represents the minister's personal views."
Mujalli's remarks on Monday about the Jordanian soldier, Ahmad Dakamseh, drew an expression of "revulsion" from Israel.
"I support the... demand to free Ahmad Dakamseh. He's a hero. He does not deserve prison," said Mujalli, who became a minister last week.
Mujalli, a former president of the Jordan Bar Association, was Dakamseh's lawyer.
Israel summoned Jordan's ambassador on Tuesday, protesting that the call to release Dakamseh was "all the more serious as it came from the minister in charge of law and order."
Tensions were already running high in Israel amid the turmoil in the Arab world that saw its long-time peace partner Hosni Mubarak of Egypt quit office last week.
Jordan is the only other Arab nation to have signed a peace treaty with the Jewish state.
In March 1997, Dakamseh fired an automatic weapon at the Israeli schoolgirls as they visited Baqura, a scenic peninsula on the Jordan River near the Israeli border, killing seven and wounding five as well as a teacher.
The attack came less than three years after Jordan and Israel signed their peace treaty.
The motives of Dakamseh, who was 30 at the time and a married father of three, were never clear.
Then-king Hussein cut short a visit to Europe and rushed home to condemn the attack. He later travelled to Israel to offer his condolences to the families of the murdered schoolgirls. Jordan also paid compensation.
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