OK folks here we go again. Last week, there was just a short blurb in the news that there was a coup attempt in the country of Jordan. Nothing more after that.
I had to ask, with Jordan being a key player in maintaining peace in the Middle East, what really happened and why is it not being covered?
Article by Nabih Bulos posted on Military.com
Authorities in Jordan on Saturday arrested a number of top officials and a royal family member, state news reported, in what appears to have been a thwarted attempted coup.
There were also unconfirmed reports the former crown prince was under house arrest.
The arrests were announced by the state-run Petra News agency, quoting an unnamed official who said Sharif Hassan bin Zaid, a member of the royal family, and Bassem Awadallah (ah way dalla), a prominent official who once ran the royal court, were arrested “for security reasons” along with “others” after “close monitoring.”
“An investigation into the matter is ongoing,” said the source.
The news comes as a shock in the desert kingdom, a close regional ally of the U.S. often lauded for its stability in a crisis-ridden neighborhood.
Also swept up in the dragnet — according to observers and activists on social media — was Prince Hamzah bin Hussein (hahmza bin Husan) , one-time crown prince and stepbrother to Jordan’s King Abdullah II. The monarch replaced him with his eldest son, Hussein, four years into his rule.
State news later quoted an unnamed security official who denied reports that a 20-vehicle force had raided Hamzah’s home in a suburb of West Amman, placing him under house arrest and detaining members of his security detail and members of his staff.
His head of office, Yasser Majali (ma ha lee), was picked up after a heavily armed force burst into his relative’s home, according to Basma Al Majali, a family member who wrote of the incident on Twitter.
“Communication was lost with them more than three hours ago,” she tweeted.
Late Saturday night, Jordan’s Chief of Staff Lt. General Mahmoud Yousef Huneit issued a statement saying Prince Hamzah had not been detained but instead was “asked to stop movements and activities that were being employed to target Jordan’s security and stability,” adding that this was done within “the framework of comprehensive joint investigations undertaken by the security services.”
“All the procedures were conducted within the framework of the law and after being required as a result of vigorous investigations,” he said.
“No one is above the law, and Jordan’s security and stability is above any consideration.”
The Saudi royal court issued a statement in solidarity with King Abdullah, asserting it stood with the Jordanian monarch and supported whatever decisions he makes to “preserve the security and stability and frustrate any attempt to tamper with them.” Both Bahrain and the Palestinian Authority followed suit.
U.S. State Department spokesman Ned Price said, “We are closely following the reports and in touch with Jordanian officials. King Abdullah is a key partner of the United States, and he has our full support.”
Jordan’s 59-year-old king came to power in 1999, when King Hussein before his death elevated the British-educated, eldest son from his first marriage from his relatively obscure position as head of Jordan’s special forces to become the new monarch.
Since then, King Abdullah has been a top U.S. ally, often allowing U.S. troops to stage operations from Jordanian territory and participating in the anti-Islamic State campaign.
The kingdom, which has scant resources, received $1.5 billion in assistance from the U.S. in 2020 — a result of Abdullah’s popularity among congressional leaders.
Yet he is decidedly less popular at home, where Jordanians often compare him negatively to his father, a deeply popular, charismatic figure who steered the country through many convulsions, including several regional wars, a military coup, and many assassination attempts.
As the eldest son of Queen Nour (nee Lisa Halaby), his father’s fourth and final queen, the now-41-year-old prince Hamzah was thought to be King Hussein’s top choice as successor; he was passed over because he was still in school. Nevertheless, King Hussein insisted on putting Hamzah next in line to the throne after Abdullah.
Note: Queen Noor of Jordan was born Lisa Najeeb Halaby on August 23, 1951, in Washington, D.C. Her father, Najeeb Elias Halaby, was born in Dallas, Texas of Syrian descent, and distinguished himself as a U.S. Navy test pilot and lawyer who became head of the Federal Aviation Administration under President John F. Kennedy. He was also the CEO of Pan American World Airways. Her mother, Doris Carlquist, was born in Leavenworth, Washington, of Swedish descent, and studied political science at the University of Washington
Back to our story. The news comes at a precarious time for the monarch. The country is experiencing a brutal coronavirus wave, with fatalities only recently dipping below 100 a day. Discontent has risen, with Jordanians increasingly angry over the government’s handling of the pandemic and its inability to contain the economic devastation wreaked by strong lockdowns and weekend quarantines.
Former Crown Prince Hamzah’s lawyer released a video to the BBC following the arrests, in which the prince states that he was instructed to remain at home and that his other forms of communication had been shut down.
On Monday, he released an audio recording stating that although he did not wish to “escalate,” the restrictions on himself and his family were “unacceptable.”
The high-level arrests come in the midst of government repression of protests against increasingly authoritarian restrictions in Jordan. In his video, Prince Hamzah stated that “Jordanians have lost hope” as a result of corruption and misrule.
Although Hamzah did not mention his half-brother the king, he recorded the video in front of an image of their father, the late and revered King Hussein, whom Hamzah resembles.
Prince Hamzah is popular in Jordan, especially for his close ties to East bank Jordanian tribes as well as his command of Arabic, in contrast to King Abdullah, who is seen by some as too close to Palestinian interests due in part to the Palestinian heritage of his wife, Queen Rania, as well as his initially less-than-fluent command of Arabic.
The narrative put forward by the Jordanian government is that Prince Hamzah was involved with “foreign agents” in an attempted coup.
In particular, Roy Shaposhnik, an Israeli friend of the prince who offered to host his wife and children, has been described by Jordanian security as a “former Mossad agent,” which Shaposhnik denies.
Other rumors about foreign connections remain unsubstantiated: possible ties to the UAE appear unlikely, as none of the Gulf monarchs are interested in undermining the authority of one of their own.
The King may have hoped to keep his half-brother quiet as the palace sought to placate Jordanians by shifting blame for the country’s problems on to a handful of elites.
Bassem Awadallah, a former confidant of King Abdullah II and later an advisor to Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, is often a fall man for the king: unpopular decisions can be blamed on him rather than on Abdullah himself.
During the Arab Spring uprising of 2011, protestors chanted for his removal from government. The Jordanian regime may have hoped that by arresting him, along with Sharif Hassan bin Zaid, a member of the royal family who also served as envoy to Saudi Arabia, frustrated Jordanians would feel temporarily appeased.
In addition to their arrest, key figures of the Majali tribe were arrested, a powerful family that has historically expressed dissatisfaction with Abdullah’s rule.
Given the close ties between Prince Hamzah and those arrested, security services may have tried to contain the former crown prince by placing him under house arrest as a precaution.
Yet rather than quietly accept, Prince Hamzah released the video while he still could, thereby escalating the situation, and forcing the Jordanian government to allege a coup attempt.
At present, no clear evidence of an actual coup attempt has emerged. The incident therefore resembles the alleged coup attempt against President Erdogan in Turkey in the summer of 2016.
It remains unclear what precisely occurred, yet Erdogan used the alleged coup attempt to crack down on dissent and consolidate his power.
King Abdullah, feeling threatened by ongoing protests, high unemployment, high COVID cases, and dismal economic prospects, may decide that the alleged coup attempt offers a useful excuse to clamp down on any criticism of his rule.
Annelle Sheline on Responsible Statecraft Website
Prince Hamzah’s threat to King Abdullah’s authority is tied not only to his popularity, but to the fact that their father King Hussein, intended for Prince Hamzah to serve as Abdullah’s successor.
Hamzah has long expressed support for a more democratic system in Jordan, as well as more authority to powerful tribes who ruled Jordan before the Hashemite regime was instated by the British in 1921.
Ironically, upon his coronation, King Abdullah II was also seen as a proponent of democratic reforms, yet in the intervening two decades of his rule, he has consolidated power in himself, and designated his son Hussein as crown prince in 2009 when the prince turned 15.
The US, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE all expressed support for Abdullah in response to the alleged coup narrative. The US and the other Arab monarchs see the ongoing rule of their regimes as necessary for regional stability.
Despite pushing for greater democratic reforms after 9/11, the US has largely refrained from advocating too strenuously for democratization among its Arab security partners.
Instead, despite President Biden’s stated commitment to supporting democracy and human rights, the US shows no sign of altering its robust support for authoritarian governments in the Middle East.
Countries like Jordan and Egypt, that once appeared to be moving towards greater freedom for their people, are now simply additional data points in a global trend towards authoritarianism.
Article on the website, RUSI, The Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) is the world’s oldest and the UK’s leading defense and security think tank.
The author, Tobias Borck is an Associate Fellow at RUSI; an independent researcher and analyst specialising in Middle East politics and security;
As US President Joe Biden assumes office, many governments in the Middle East are looking to Washington to see what the change in the White House will mean for them.
While some Middle Eastern states may have preferred a second term for President Donald Trump, King Abdullah II of Jordan has been among the region’s leaders most eagerly looking forward to the arrival of the new administration — he was the first Arab leader to congratulate Joe Biden on his election in November.
However, for the Jordanian monarchy, one of the US’s — and the UK’s — longest-standing Arab partners, the future looks deeply uncertain.
Even for a country as accustomed to having to navigate crises and a challenging regional environment as Jordan, the past few years have been extremely difficult.
The Trump administration was not overtly hostile to Jordan, but its actions in the region, particularly with regard to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, pulled into question the Jordanian Kingdom’s most fundamental strategic interests.
Even though Jordan was one of only two Arab countries that already had full relations with Israel (Egypt was the other one), it was essentially sidelined from US efforts, spearheaded by Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, to further bolster Israel’s position in the region and improve its relations with other Arab governments.
Jordan cautiously welcomed the Abraham Accords (UAE and Israel agreement under Trump), in principle, but watched in dismay as Washington appeared to move further and further away from its traditional support for the two-state solution with a viable Palestinian state.
The recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, the cutting of US funding for the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) and the Palestinian Authority (PA), and the presentation of the ‘Prosperity to Peace’ plan that contained provisions for the Israeli annexation of large parts of the West Bank and no right to return for Palestinian refugees, all piled pressure on Jordan.
Given its status as the custodian of the Muslim and Christian holy sites in Jerusalem, and with a majority of Jordan’s population of Palestinian origin (including 2.1 million refugees), these issues go right to the heart of the Jordanian monarchy’s legitimacy.
Lest they jeopardize their access to US aid, King Abdullah and his government could do little except voice cautious criticism in public, plead their case behind the scenes and hope for political change in Washington.
US economic support for Jordan amounted to just over $1 billion in 2020 (in addition to $425 million in military assistance aid to help deal with over 650,000 Syrian refugees still based in the country), a sizeable chunk of the Kingdom’s annual budget. Government spending for 2021 is estimated to be $13.2 billion.
Economic necessities meant that Jordan had to walk a diplomatic tightrope elsewhere, too. In the regional rift between Qatar and Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and Egypt, Jordan could not afford to take sides.
Heavily dependent on its economic relations with all the Gulf monarchies — as trade partners, providers of financial aid and hosts of hundreds of thousands of Jordanian expatriate workers — Jordan had to tread carefully for over three years.
However, King Abdullah is an experienced crisis manager — since the death of Sultan Qaboos of Oman in January 2020, he is the Arab world’s longest-serving head of state — and there are some rays of light in early 2021.
The Biden administration is likely to pay more attention to Jordan’s concerns; the Gulf monarchies have finally decided to reconcile; and the arrival of vaccines gives possible hope that the end of the pandemic is in sight.
None of this, however, is going to ultimately resolve Jordan’s problems. In fact, even once the dust thrown up by the Trump administration, the Gulf crisis and the pandemic settles, the Kingdom has to confront new realities that bring into question both its regional role and the sustainability of its muddling-through domestic strategy.
The Biden administration may reinstate funding for Palestinian organizations and restore America’s rhetorical commitment to a two-state solution, without making it any more likely to become reality.
The recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital or the expansion of settlements in the West Bank have created realities that make the establishment of a Palestinian state an ever-more distant prospect.
Israeli annexation of at least parts of the West Bank is also sure to continue to loom on the horizon, particularly if Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu finds a way to hold on to power.
The normalisation of relations between Israel and the Gulf states means that Jordan’s traditional role as a useful intermediary has become largely irrelevant, leaving it somewhat adrift in the turmoil of regional politics.
Moreover, Gulf support for Jordan’s economy had already started to dry up before the pandemic and there are reasons to assume that it will not rebound any time soon.
King Abdullah can continue to cycle through prime ministers and cabinets , they have had 15 prime ministers since Abdullah’s coronation in 1999 — but this will not substantially reduce socioeconomic pressures at home. Serious economic reforms risk further provoking popular discontent, while some of the security measures the government has implemented to maintain control over the population risk negating any benefits they might produce, such as a more open business environment.
It will clearly be a difficult year for Jordan. Amman will look to Washington for help — political and material — and hope that it can reclaim at least some of its former status as a useful intermediary, whose continued stability is factored into the Biden administration’s regional policy.
So folks, it turns out there are essentially two separate issues here. One is Prince Hamzah, the popular elder son of the late King Hussein, who rattled Jordan’s security chiefs with his recent contacts with disgruntled tribal figures. The other involves a number of officials who are alleged to have had links to at least one other country.
Yet governments in the region know that were Jordan’s monarchy to fall, this could trigger a dangerous chain of events. Hence the rapid and public declarations of support for King Abdullah from his neighbors. Waiting in the wings, both al-Qaeda and ISIS would be only too delighted to see chaos reign in a country that has so far been a linchpin of stability in the Middle East.
So, with our lesson today, do we continue to back Jordan with our cash and military, or do we cut our losses and leave them at the mercy of their neighbors? Better yet, will throwing more money at the Middle East in general, eventually solve the problems in that region of the world?