By Naseem Tarawnah
While King Abdullah has managed to maneuver through the turbulent regional weather of the past decade, hardly a year passes without Jordanians such as myself are forced to wonder: what would his father King Hussein have done?
The late monarch’s legacy is as defined by his pursuit of a peaceful resolution to the Arab-Israel conflict as it is by the creation of modern day Jordan — to the extent that he was perhaps known more for the former than the latter. During his reign, Jordan was never relegated to the back benches of peace talks, but was rather an active cog in the machinery of diplomacy, emboldened by the realization that whatever happens west of the River Jordan is likely to have just as big an impact on its east bank. Although this knowledge has never faded in the halls of the palace, the kingdom’s role in the peace process has, for the better part of a decade, been largely reshaped. This has been somewhat due to a shift in priorities that has caused the state to focus on more domestic issues, as well as the fact that the peace process has (for the better part of a decade) been largely absent, replaced by regional instability.
In recent years, Jordan’s focus on the peace process has struggled to regain ground — and lost time. From King Abdullah’s unexpected speech to the US Congress in 2007, in which he referred to “60 years of Palestinian dispossession and 40 years of occupation” as having “left a bitter legacy of disappointment and despair”, to his book entitled “Our Last Best Chance”, which focuses almost entirely on the need for all parties to return to the negotiating table, this emphasis has become palpable. Now, in the midst of the “Arab Spring”, it has manifested the Amman talks.
The outcome was predictable and utterly unsurprising. It seemed that only a fraction of a moment had passed before Palestinian and Israeli delegations were accusing each other and assigning blame to a process that has not only broken down, but rather, simply, become broken.
“In light of the results of the Amman meetings, the PLO Executive Committee considers the Israeli government and it alone to be entirely responsible for their failure,” said Palestine Liberation Organization official Yasser Abed Rabbo. Israel’s Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said he would get in his car “at any time and go to Ramallah” if he had to, just to sit down with the Palestinian leadership and negotiate. “But Abu Mazen isn’t ready,” Netanyahu continued. Even the United Nation’s Ban Ki-moon could do little to resuscitate the talks during his recent visit to the region, where his call for an Israeli freeze on all settlement-building activities did not go over well. In the end, the Jerusalem Post perhaps best summed up the entire endeavor, calling the talks “another exercise in futile diplomacy”.
While the talks are indeed an example of diplomatic disintegration, they also exemplify the fact that diplomacy is infinite in nature. And if there’s one thing the Jordanian leadership has historically adhered to, it is the belief that diplomacy is never a futile exercise. If anything, the belief that the peace process must continue — dragged kicking and screaming if need be — has only grown stronger during the past year.
For while the Arab Spring has caused every Arab nation to shift its focus towards domestic issues, for Jordan, the status of Palestine is a domestic issue. And the impact of the issue has played out consistently throughout the past year. Jordan’s Islamist Action Front, for instance, has returned to the public arena after a three-year absence. The party, deemed to consist mostly of Jordanians of Palestinian origin, has traditionally played a role as the country’s foremost political opposition. And while its political rhetoric has, for once, become more domestic in nature, it still maintains a stranglehold on the Palestinian issue. In the past year it has struggled to walk the fine line between Jordanian issues, such as poverty, unemployment, corruption, and self-governance, and the lingering issue of Palestine, which has always kept its base riled up.
The party’s return to the political landscape has also triggered the rise of what can only be described as heightened Jordanian nationalism, personifying fears that Islamists, despite their pro-reform rhetoric, may secretly hope for regime change in Jordan, an event that could realize the worst fears of East Bankers: an alternative Palestinian homeland on Jordanian soil. The rhetoric concerning this subject that has emanated from right-wing Israelis in recent months has only fanned the flames domestically.
While the majority of the kingdom’s people have favored reform over revolution, many have sought to elevate their message with nationalist rhetoric that has sometimes manifested as anti-Palestinian sentiment. Jordan’s retired military veterans, who have long accused the state of offering too many “non-Jordanians” citizenship, have even formed a political party to counter the rise of the Islamists.
Thus, the urgency of the Amman talks is perhaps self-explanatory. Jordan’s and Palestine’s destinies have always been interwoven despite physical and even political divides. The Arab spring has become a mere catalyst in this equation, forcing it to the forefront of concern for the king and his government. Progress on this front would likely go a long way to quell political discontent at home, especially when it comes to subduing fears of an alternative homeland and removing it as a legitimate political card for various parties to play. The Amman talks may be a step in the right direction for Jordan, but Amman must sustain a leadership role in the process if it hopes to reap the rewards on the domestic front.
Naseem Tarawnah is cofounder of 7iber and blogs at the Black Iris. This commentary is published by DAILY NEWS EGYPT in collaboration with bitterlemons-international.org
