Frimet and Arnold Roth, the parents of Malki Roth, a 15-year-old U.S. citizen killed in the bombing of the Sbarro pizzeria in Jerusalem along with others on Aug. 9, 2001, met privately on May 13 with U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee. They presented him with a petition bearing nearly 30,000 signatures calling for justice.
The petition urges the United States to press the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan to extradite Ahlam Tamimi, a Hamas terrorist who confesses to orchestrating the atrocity that took the lives of 16 people, including seven children and a pregnant woman. Three of those murdered were Americans, including Malki. More than 130 others were injured in the attack.
U.S. federal charges against Tamimi were issued in Washington under seal in 2013 and made public in October 2017. But Tamimi, harbored by Jordan, remains free. She’s a wanted fugitive on the FBI’s “Most Wanted Terrorists” list and subject to a $5 million State Department reward.
During the one-hour meeting, the Roths also presented Huckabee with a framed photo of their daughter and her shattered cell phone, which was recovered from the site of the attack by the police.
“This phone is one of the few physical traces we have left of Malki,” said Arnold Roth. “Malki had written onto it a brief Hebrew text reminding herself that it’s forbidden to speak ill of other people.
“What brought us to the embassy was remembrance, but also justice,” Roth added. “Justice in the Tamimi prosecution has been thwarted for years and barely mentioned publicly by the very U.S. officials who bear the responsibility of bringing the fugitive to trial. We came to implore the government represented by Ambassador Huckabee to carry out its duty to protect and stand for American victims of terrorism abroad.”
The Roths submitted the petition for delivery to U.S. President Donald Trump, Attorney General Pam Bondi and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, urging decisive diplomatic engagement to ensure Jordan honors its 1995 extradition treaty with the United States. Jordan’s courts have ruled that Tamimi cannot be extradited under Jordanian law, citing a legal technicality disputed by U.S. experts and capable of being fixed only by Jordan itself, a step the kingdom fails to take.
“Tamimi has never shown the smallest degree of remorse. The massacre she spearheaded made her a celebrity in Jordan and beyond. She lives freely and publicly in Jordan, where she hosted her own terror-promoting, made-in-Jordan weekly television show for five years. It is unconscionable that Jordan, a lavishly funded beneficiary of U.S.-taxpayer-funded aid, has enabled her to be glorified as an icon while her victims’ families, including American families, are ignored,” Roth added.
The Roths’ meeting follows Arnold Roth’s address at an international policy summit in April, where he appealed for U.S. moral clarity and consistent leadership in fighting terrorism. With the 24th anniversary of the Sbarro massacre approaching this summer, the Roths say they are not giving up.
“We represent thousands of voices demanding that the United States bring an end to tolerance of Jordan’s obstructiveness and dangerous mixed messages,” said Frimet Roth. “How can the United States maintain a strategic alliance with a nation that celebrates the murder of children and shelters their killer?”