Amman is seeking ways of coaxing Israeli and Palestinian negotiators to return to talks, Jordan's top diplomat said on Wednesday after meeting Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas.

Negotiators from both sides held five rounds of "exploratory talks" in January under the sponsorship of Jordan and the Middle East peacemaking Quartet with the aim of finding a way back to direct negotiations which collapsed in 2010.

Two explosions on Monday hit a pipeline which supplies Egyptian gas to Israel and Jordan, marking the 13th such attack in just over a year, security officials said.

Six gunmen in an unmarked vehicle set explosives in two different parts of the pipeline, about 15 meters (yards) apart, one official told Agence France Presse.

Police in Jordan's southern city of Tafileh fired tear gas on Monday to disperse angry unemployed demonstrators who demanded that the authorities make good on their promise of jobs.

"Scores of unemployed youth demonstrated in Tafileh, throwing stones at the governorate building as well as police, who had to fire tear gas to break up the protest," the state-run Petra news agency reported.

Eight people connected to a tribally-owned construction company were indicted by a federal grand jury in an elaborate kickback and money laundering scheme involving Iraqi construction projects, U.S. Attorney Kenneth J. Gonzales announced Friday.

The 91-count indictment filed this week said former officers of Laguna Construction Co. and four foreign nationals from Iraq, Jordan and Lebanon face charges including conspiracy, wire fraud and money laundering after a four-year, international investigation involving U.S. defense contracts for wartime rebuilding projects in Iraq.

A Jordanian military tribunal on Thursday freed on bail an outspoken former member of parliament who is on trial for urging a revolt in the kingdom, a court official said on Thursday.

"The state security court today released Ahmed Abbadi from jail on bail of 10,000 dinars (around $14,000)," the official told Agence France Presse without providing further details.

Human Rights Watch on Tuesday urged Jordan to drop criminal charges against an outspoken former lawmaker who called for a revolt in the kingdom.

The criminal charges against Ahmed Abbadi, "who has peacefully advocated making Jordan a republic violate freedom of expression and should be dropped immediately," the New York-based rights watchdog said in a statement.

An eventual fall of Syria's regime, followed by the rise of an Islamist government could create a quandary for Jordan, a small country that has strategic ties with its northern neighbor, analysts say.

At the same time, even if Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime survives pro-democracy protests against his 11-year rule, relations between Amman and Damascus are unlikely to improve, at least in the short term.

Jordan said on Tuesday it will take part in an international conference in Tunisia on the deadly unrest in Syria, while insisting the kingdom is against foreign military intervention.

Foreign Minister Nasser Judeh said he will attend the "friends of Syria" conference in Tunis on Friday aimed at finding ways to end the Syrian regime's bloody repression of protests.

Jordan has given assurances to Britain that Islamist cleric Abu Qatada, once dubbed an aide to Osama bin Laden, will get a "fair" trial if London extradites him to the kingdom, a government official said on Wednesday.

"Jordan has reassured British Home Office Minister James Brokenshire that it is committed to protecting the legal rights of Jordanian citizen Abu Qatada," the official told Agence France Presse.

Jordan's powerful Muslim Brotherhood on Sunday called for "jihad" against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime and support for a rebel army, saying it is "an Islamic duty."

"This duty requires all Muslims to support the (rebel) Free Syrian Army against the aggression of the regime's criminal and brutal forces," Brotherhood leader Hammam Saeed was quoted as saying in a statement on the group's website.