A Future Jordan - نحن الأردن

Caught in the middle, as usual by THE ECONOMIST

Caught in the middle, as usual
Nov 11th 2005
The Economist

A co-ordinated terrorist attack on three hotels in Amman shows that Jordan is not the oasis of calm it claims to be

THE vaunted tranquillity of Jordan amid the seemingly permanent instability afflicting its neighbours was bloodily interrupted on Wednesday November 9th by three bombs, probably set off suicidally, in posh hotels frequented by westerners, Israelis and the Jordanian elite in the capital, Amman. First reports said that the blasts, in the Grand Hyatt, the Radisson and the Days Inn hotels, killed at least 57 people and wounded around 100. The Jordanian assumption—bolstered by a claim on the internet—was that al-Qaeda was responsible.

But it is easy to guess. Jordan is a vital regional ally of the United States, which promotes and bolsters the country and its 43-year-old king, Abdullah, who succeeded his late father, Hussein, six years ago, as a showpiece of economic and political progress and globalisation. With only 5m people and wedged between Israel, Syria, Iraq and Saudi Arabia ("the neighbours from hell", as the king has privately called them), Jordan is now the world's fourth-biggest recipient of American aid.

It has also become a hub for western diplomats, businessmen, aid agencies and military people going in and out of Iraq. Moreover, Amman is the main meeting-point for expatriate Iraqis, some 400,000 of whom are reckoned to live there, some connected to the old regime and the insurgency, others to the new order struggling to assert itself. Several hundred Jordanians, including the arch-terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who claims the al-Qaeda franchise in Iraq, are probably fighting against the Americans across the border.

The Jordanian king took a gamble in 2003 by deciding to back the Americans in their invasion of Iraq—unlike his father, who remained neutral during the first Gulf war against Iraq in 1991, to Saddam Hussein's delight and the Americans' intense displeasure. But, despite the consequent increase in American largesse, King Abdullah's decision was generally disliked by his citizens, over half of whom are of Palestinian origin: they loathe what they see as America's bias towards Israel. Most of Jordan's so-called East Bankers (ie, those who are not Palestinian) are equally hostile to American policy, sympathising strongly with the "resistance" by their Sunni co-religionists against the new Shia-dominated order in Iraq. The most popular political party in Jordan according to opinion polls, though far from being the choice of the majority, is the Islamic Action Front, an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood and an admirer of the Islamists of Hamas in Israel.

However, the bombings in Amman have been greeted by widespread anger in Jordan and the wider Arab world. Rallies against them were held on Friday in the Jordanian capital, and a number of groups, including the Islamic Action Front, called on their followers to hold further marches. Apparently taken aback by this hostile response, the group that had claimed responsibility for the attack issued a further (unverified) statement justifying the atrocity on the grounds that the hotels had been used as bases for waging war on Islam.

Tribal troubles
Even if most of his countrymen stand behind him in condemning the bombs, King Abdullah has other problems. He has been backing a strongly liberal economic policy, which has annoyed the old tribal conservatives on whom the Hashemite monarchy has depended since it was installed by the British 80-plus years ago. Seeming to answer the Americans' appeal for more democratisation in the Middle East, he launched an ambitious "national agenda" earlier this year which, he said, would "lead the country into a new age where there is more press freedom, health insurance for all, an independent judiciary, a more politically active public, political pluralism, active and powerful parties with clear-cut platforms, and empowered women and youth."

One recommendation expected to be made by the committees which have been elaborating the national agenda is for a new electoral law that would give Palestinians fairer representation in parliament. That would annoy the old guard too.

As a former senior minister puts it, "he's trying to take Jordan out of the region's mentality." But the king has met resistance across the spectrum. "We cannot afford shocks," says the former minister. In the summer, the king's favourite moderniser, Bassam Aawadallah, an ardent liberal economist, was forced out as finance minister, partly for being too abrasive.

For all the talk of modernisation and political pluralism, Jordan is still a politely authoritarian state run by a king whose near-absolute power is underpinned by a ruthless and watchful security service. His reforms are being imposed from the top down. The press, though it breathes a bit more freely, is co-opted and still occasionally muzzled. A recent poll by the Centre for Strategic Studies at the University of Jordan found that 77% of respondents felt they could not "criticise the government without fearing punishment", against only 16% who thought they could."

The perpetrators of this week's bombs will be hunted down without mercy; dozens have been arrested already, including some Iraqis. All the same, the young king knows he must be careful. Too fierce a bout of repression could backfire. Beneath its amiable surface, Jordan hosts many dangerously competing tensions.

posted by Ashraf Zeitoon @ 7:18 AM