Lion of Jordan

by Avi Shlaim

  A particularly vulnerable civilian target was the East Ghor Canal, which carried water from the Yarmouk River in the north of Jordan. It was literally the lifeline of that part of the Jordan Valley that was still cultivated and populated despite the border war. On 23 May an Israeli patrol destroyed a section of the canal. Repeated Jordanian efforts to repair the damage were frustrated until the Israelis received private assurances that serious new measures would be taken to prevent fedayeen attacks on the kibbutzim across the river. The publicity given by the Israelis to these private assurances made effective enforcement politically impossible. A period of calm lasted long enough to enable essential repairs to be made. But the canal was breached by the IDF a second time in August and a third time in December.46 Dayan was the chief advocate of holding the East Ghor Canal hostage to effective Jordanian policing of the irregular forces on their territory. If the policy failed to achieve its declared objective, Dayan advocated raising the threshold of pain. He was reluctant to accept any political constraints on military action, his policy being to meet force with much greater force. It was simply the latest version of the policy he had followed as chief of staff in the 1950s. Within the cabinet this met with only mild opposition and he could usually rely on the support of the hawkish prime minister. At a cabinet meeting on 11 August a proposal to put the East Ghor Canal out of action again was agreed with no votes against and only one abstention. The only real debate was whether to use the army or the air force to do so.47

  The harder Israel struck at the fedayeen, the more popular the latter became in Jordan, and the greater was the threat they posed to the Hashemite regime. Hussein understood that the Palestinian resistance movement was eroding his power base. There was increasingly loud criticism of the royal family for their extravagances and for surrounding themselves with sycophants who kept them in ignorance of the true state of the nation.48 Hussein reacted to the challenge by moving further away from the Palestinians rather than towards them. He seemed tempted to abandon the policy of associating Palestinians with his regime and to fall back on xenophobic East Bankers. He embarked on a major reorganization of the army structure and command, appointing a group of officers with unsavoury past histories, described by one British defence attaché as ‘the Mafia’, to senior posts. ‘As he looked wistfully around at the possibilities of withdrawal into his Transjordanian shell he began the formation of a private army outside the normal chain of military command, responsible for his own protection as well as for use in case of need in an internal security role; and an atmosphere of “good old Transjordan” prevailed at a series of light-hearted cricket matches between the Court and the British community.’49

  The most notable change was the appointment in June of Sharif Nasser bin Jamil as commander-in-chief of the armed forces. Sharif Nasser was controversial because of his forceful personality and ostentatious lifestyle. He liked hunting, riding and fast cars, women, drinking and gambling. Hussein’s uncle appeared to outsiders to be one of his closest advisers, friends and supporters. But his notorious illegal traffic in arms and drugs placed a strain on his relationship with Hussein. An ultraconservative monarchist who was entirely dependent on the king’s favour, he was also one of the regime’s strongest bulwarks and was known to maintain an extensive intelligence network within the army. Even those officers who hated him and all he represented acknowledged respect for him as a soldier and leader of men. Nevertheless, his image was poor; he was feared and hated by Palestinians throughout the kingdom and especially on the West Bank. In foreign policy Sharif Nasser was pro-Western, anti-Communist and anti his Egyptian namesake. He had not forgiven the Iraqis for overthrowing the Hashemite monarchy in Iraq in 1958, and he remained an implacable opponent of any republican regime in Baghdad.50

  What is less well known is that beneath the surface Hussein had serious misgivings about his Iraqi-born maternal uncle. One member of the family described Sharif Nasser as a very destructive influence and as Hussein’s bête noire. According to this source, Sharif Nasser was a good tactical field commander at battalion or brigade level but a disaster at HQ or as commander-in-chief. He interfered in everything. One problem was that Sharif Nasser had a warehouse full of weapons in his house in the Ghor. He always tried to have his own feudal enclave, as if the laws of Jordan did not apply to him. He also had his own entourage of royal guards. Many times Hussein had to surround his uncle’s house with armoured cars from a loyal regiment to bring him to heel. On one occasion the problem nearly got out of hand. The army was going to seize the arms warehouse, and Sharif Nasser’s guards resisted. But before it turned into a shoot-out, Hussein intervened personally to defuse the crisis. Sharif Nasser was a member of Hussein’s family, so the king could not throw him out; he could only try to contain him.51 The two qualities that probably recommended Sharif Nasser to Hussein as commander-in-chief of the armed forces in 1969 were his unswerving loyalty to the regime and his rabidly anti-Palestinian sentiments. His brief was to bring the Palestinian guerrilla groups under control and to prevent their attacks on Israel.

  Hussein’s mood changed perceptibly during the summer. In the past he had frequently referred to the need for visible progress within a matter of a few months at the outside if the chance of peaceful settlement was not to be lost and extremists were not to gain control of the situation. Now he seemed to adjust his mind to the thought that quick progress was simply not possible and that Jordan would have to face a long period of stalemate.52 The secret meetings between Rifa’i and Herzog continued but led nowhere. One meeting took place in London on 26 July and another on 17 September. Herzog used these meetings to give the Jordanians a pat on the back for the renewed efforts they had made to rein in the fedayeen and to urge them to intensify these efforts and to coordinate them more closely with Israel’s military commanders. Yet a written paper with Israel’s principles for a peace treaty that had been promised did not materialize, and the excuse given, rather illogically, was the persistence of fedayeen attacks. Rifa’i said that they had been waiting in vain for this paper since May. Israel’s position on Jerusalem was particularly perplexing. On the one hand it said that the Jerusalem question was open to negotiations and on the other it persisted in presenting the world with faits accomplis. Its record was such that everyone in Jordan had become a pessimist regarding Israel’s interest in a peace settlement.53

  Although Israel evinced no interest in peace talks, Hussein did not give up; he turned to the Americans. His basic objective since June 1967 remained unchanged: to recover the West Bank. He still needed Nasser to protect his back from his Arab opponents. Initially, he had visualized America as the trump card in forcing the Israelis into a conciliatory mood, but he was repeatedly let down by them. Despite all his disappointments, he did not despair; he tried one tack after another. The reason for this persistence was that, even though his close relationship with America did not gain him his land, it did give him security. It deterred the Israelis from toying with the idea of overthrowing him. It afforded him a measure of protection against hardline Israelis, such as Moshe Dayan, who saw him as an obstacle to a direct deal with the local Palestinian leaders on the West Bank. Moreover, time was not on Hussein’s side; the clock kept ticking on the hopes for a settlement. His own popularity in Jordan had long since peaked, and political, economic and administrative paralysis was spreading in his country. Israel exploited this weakness to consolidate its control over the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

  With the talks with the Israelis failing to progress in the summer of 1969, Hussein made another approach to the Nixon administration. Rifa’i told Joseph Sisco, the assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern Affairs, that, on the authority of Hussein, he was prepared to commence direct, secret negotiations with the Israelis, with Sisco present, on condition that advance assurances were supplied by either the US or Israel that the Jerusalem issue would really be negotiable. Rifa’i indicated that US assurances in this respect mattered more than Israeli ones. The assurances so
ught by Rifa’i were that the US would live up to the spirit as well as the letter of its November 1967 commitments regarding the Jordanian role in Jerusalem.54 The State Department noted that Hussein had concluded that Jordan’s national survival required a settlement with Israel. It pointed out that the outcome of the negotiations might be decisive for Hussein’s life and for the life of his country. But it also noted that, despite some ambiguity on some elements of a settlement, Israel’s position seemed firm in respect of a unified Jerusalem under its control. Nor did Israel wish to deal with Jordan through any intermediary. Hussein’s approach produced no results. The only help the administration was willing to give him was in finding a competent and discreet American law firm.55 This was not what Hussein had had in mind.

  American indifference and Palestinian militancy drove Hussein back into the arms of the Israelis. Ultimately, Israel was the only party that could bring about a change in the status quo. One of the most interesting meetings in the dialogue across the battle lines occurred in London on 28 September. The Jordanian side was represented by Rifa’i and Sharif Nasser; the Israeli side by Herzog and Chief of Staff Chaim Bar-Lev. Sharif Nasser said he intended to deal sternly with Fatah and requested Israel’s help in expelling the organization to Syria. This was music to Herzog’s ears. Well versed in the history of the Hashemites and the bitterness they felt at the setbacks they had suffered in their ancestral home in the Hijaz and in Iraq, Herzog steered the conversation towards other possibilities of regional cooperation and away from the West Bank. He spoke with enthusiasm about the possibilities that awaited the Hashemite kingdom to the south in Saudi Arabia and to the north in Iraq. In his notes Herzog described the Jordanian commander-in-chief as ‘macho’ and as much more energetic than his predecessor, Amer Khammash. Unlike Khammash, Sharif Nasser regarded Fatah as a threat to the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan and appeared to stand altogether outside the circle of Arab political thought. The only point he made that did not please Herzog was that he could not prevent Fatah operations in the occupied part of Jordan. Rifa’i reported that Hussein agreed to another meeting after the Israeli elections and that he hoped the prime minister would participate.56

  The cabinet defence committee received a full report on the London meeting. Herzog was proud of the fact that they had skirted round political issues and concentrated mainly on military cooperation. Dayan was not impressed. He said that the Jordanians were playing games, and that while the chief of staff was receiving promises in London, there was heavy shelling at the front. He gave notice that he intended to submit proposals for military action against Jordan to the cabinet.

  The news from and about Jordan in general was not encouraging. There was secret information that the British were preparing a contingency plan to evacuate the king and his entourage in the event of his regime collapsing. In Amman it was announced that the security forces had aborted a plot by an extremist religious group to assassinate the king. There were other pieces of information about the disruption of public order by terrorists in Amman and in the rest of the country. A meeting was therefore convened by Meir on 9 October, to which the security chiefs were invited, to discuss possible courses of action in the event that the regime in Amman collapsed.

  At that meeting Zvi Zamir, the head of the Mossad, revealed that back in April Hussein had discussed with Harold Wilson the formation of a personal British bodyguard for him under the command of Colonel David Stirling, the founder of the SAS regiment, and that this plan did not materialize partly due to Israeli objections. Eli Zeira gave the assessment of the Military Intelligence branch that there was no imminent threat to the Jordanian regime because the Egyptians had no interest in bringing it down. He said that potential revolutionaries were trying to make contact with the Iraqis, who had a large military force stationed not far from Amman. He assumed that if a coup did take place, Suleiman Nabulsi might assume control and that Arafat might be invited to share power. Dayan said that in the event of a coup he would have to implement a particular plan. He was not specific, but it was probably for the capture of certain areas that were considered essential for Israel’s security. He also raised the question of preventing the pro-Soviet extremists from taking over Jordan and of talking to the Americans about action to stop the entry of Syrian and Iraqi forces into the country. He assumed that the conquest of Jordan was always in the minds of the Iraqi leaders. In the event of an actual regime change in Amman, he was of the opinion that Israel should strive towards peace with the Palestinians and enter into talks with certain of their leaders on the West Bank. In addition, he suggested making contact with Hussein’s brother Muhammad, who was reputed to be anti-Palestinian, to coordinate action against Fatah. Herzog pointed out that Hussein was opposed to such contact, but Dayan did not see this as a sufficient reason not to go ahead. He seemed to think that Muhammad might be able to reveal to them the location of Fatah bases.57

  America’s approach towards the Arab–Israeli conflict was, as so often in the past, a tug of war between the even-handed position of the State Department and the Israel-first position of the White House. Towards the end of 1969 Secretary of State William Rogers became convinced that a new American initiative was called for to break the deadlock in the Jarring Mission. Abba Eban tried to dissuade him, claiming that Israel was engaged in delicate bilateral negotiations with Jordan on the basis of the Allon Plan, though Eban failed to mention that Jordan had categorically rejected it. On 9 December, Rogers presented his peace plan for the Middle East at a conference in Washington, DC. It was based on UN Resolution 242 and envisaged Israel’s return to the international border with its neighbours, with only minor modifications and a solution to the Palestinian refugee problem. Egypt rejected it. On 18 December, Charles Yost, the US permanent representative to the UN, proposed guidelines for a settlement between Israel and Jordan based on the Rogers Plan. Yost advocated Israeli withdrawal from most of the West Bank, Jordanian administration for East Jerusalem and a settlement of the Palestinian refugee problem. Meir termed the Rogers Plan ‘a disaster for Israel’ and rejected with vehemence all the American proposals – which robbed the plan of any practical significance. The Jordanian government accepted the plan but was unable to pursue it after Egypt and Israel had rejected it.

  Despite the differences over the Rogers Plan, it was vital for Hussein to keep in step with Nasser in order to retain the material support of the Arab world. He therefore worked closely with Nasser to prepare the way for the fifth Arab League summit, which convened in Rabat on 21 December. He hoped for a reaffirmation of the commitment to a peaceful settlement of the dispute with Israel and for the continuation of aid from the oil-producing states. He argued that the Jordanian Army, not the fedayeen, was bearing the brunt of the confrontation with Israel and pleaded for increased financial aid to purchase arms. But the summit quickly degenerated into a squabble between Colonel Gaddafy, the revolutionary ruler of Libya, and King Faisal of Saudi Arabia. Nasser walked out in a huff, and the summit disbanded without adopting any resolutions.58 Its collapse left Hussein isolated and Nasser totally dependent on the Soviet Union economically and militarily.

  While the Rabat summit was still in session, Israel escalated the fighting on both the Egyptian and the Jordanian fronts. Back in March, Nasser had launched the ‘War of Attrition’ to give substance to his slogan ‘That which was taken by force can only be recovered by force.’ The War of Attrition took the form of heavy artillery bombardment of Israel’s positions on the Suez Canal, occasional air attacks and hit-and-run commando raids. Israel intensified the shelling in the Canal Zone and later resorted to deep-penetration bombing inside Egypt with the aim of toppling the regime. The result was to rally domestic support behind Nasser and to bring about deeper Soviet military involvement on his side. At the same time Israel stepped up the pressure on Jordan. On 19 December the IDF began intermittent shelling of Irbid from the Golan Heights, which lasted to the end of the year. Two days later there was a heavy Israeli air raid on Kufr A
sad in which seven soldiers were killed. On 28 December the radar station in Ajlun was bombed, and on the last day of the year Israel launched severe artillery and air attacks in the north and in the south. The year thus ended with the Arab League in complete disarray, diplomatic deadlock, a sour stand-off in the secret Jordanian–Israeli dialogue, and dangerous military escalation on both the Egyptian and the Jordanian fronts.

  14

  Civil War

  Everything else that happened in Jordan in 1970 was overshadowed by the conflict between the army and the fedayeen. One clash after another, punctuated by untenable compromises, led inexorably to a full-blown civil war in September of that year. The British ambassador to Amman began his annual review for 1969 with the terse prescription ‘the mixture as before’. His successor, John Phillips, recorded that in the following year ‘the mixture became so volatile that the container exploded.’1

  The showdown between the regime and the fedayeen in September 1970 was short and sharp, but the process that led to it was protracted and complex. Fedayeen in Arabic means ‘self-sacrificers’. The power and prestige of the fedayeen throughout the region, and especially in Jordan, grew rapidly in the aftermath of the battle of Karameh. They received material help from various Arab governments and enjoyed widespread popular support. Fedayeen raids into Israel and the Israeli-occupied West Bank continued to provoke savage Israeli reprisals against cities and civilians on the East Bank, but these attacks intensified rather than undermined the fedayeen’s support. Nor did the failure of the armed struggle to liberate any part of Palestine or the occupied territories constrain the growth of the Palestinian resistance movement. On the contrary, the conduct of the armed struggle against the Zionist enemy gave Palestinian nationalism a symbol in the shape of the fighting Palestinian; it enhanced the legitimacy of the PLO; and it enabled the PLO to build up its political, economic and social institutions. Armed struggle and state-building went hand in hand: one reinforced the other.2 Inside their own camps, the fedayeen groups enjoyed considerable administrative autonomy, had their own finance departments and ran their own welfare services. Outside the camps, they enjoyed freedom of movement and special rights, while exercising growing influence over the Jordanian part of the population. By the beginning of 1970 the Palestinian resistance movement had to all intents and purposes established a state within a state in Jordan.