AMMAN - Hamas political chief Khaled Meshaal will be allowed back into Jordan for the first time since 1999 to attend the funeral of his father who died in Amman on Friday, an official said.
"King Abdullah II's gesture to allow (Damascus-based) Meshaal to attend his father's funeral in Jordan was made for purely humanitarian reasons. There is no political significance," an official said.
Abdel Rahim Meshaal, who lived in Amman, has died at the age of 91, his family said.
Relations between Hamas and Jordan have remained strained since 1999, when the authorities expelled Meshaal along with three other members of the Palestinian résistance movement, which was democratically elected in 2006 in the Palestinian territories.
Hamas was accused at the time of threatening the security and stability of Jordan, in relation to Israel.
Mashaal escaped a 1997 assassination attempt in Amman by the Israeli intelligence service Mossad.
Jordan had had signed a peace treaty with Israel in 1994, and the Israeli failed assassination move caused the Israelis tremendous embarrassment.
Mashaal appeared as a hero and his popularity was further boosted.
Last May, Meshaal was re-elected head of the Palestinian movement's politburo.
He was born in May 1956 in a West Bank village but has lived most of his life outside the Palestinian territories, which are under illegal Israeli occupation since 1967.
Meshaal became the leader of Hamas after Israel assassinated the group's spiritual leader and founder Sheikh Ahmad Yassin and his successor Abdel Aziz Rantissi in 2004.
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