Courcy’s Intelligence Brief

Not sufficient attention is being paid to the effects of the Arab Spring on Jordan.  Native ‘East-Bankers’ are concerned that the pressures for democratic reform unleashed by the Arab Spring will give more power to the approximately 50% of the country’s population that is of Palestinian origins.  Their answer is to go slow on reform while re-energising the Palestinian struggle for control of the West Bank and, crucially, the ‘right of return’.

Jordanians of Palestinian origins hold only about a quarter of the seats in Jordan’s parliament despite their share of the population being about double that.  But the view of non-Palestinian Jordanians is that Palestinian demography must be turned into a threat to Israel not a threat to Jordan.  Until now Jordan’s Palestinians have been satisfied with their lot because of their long-term belief in ‘right of return’ to the West Bank.  It is this belief that non-Palestinian Jordanians say must be reinforced and encouraged in the face of the problems caused by the Arab Spring.

A commentary in the Jordanian daily al-Arab al-Yawm put the problem succinctly last Friday (20 January) when it argued: “There will be no solution and liquidation of the Palestinian cause at the expense of Jordan and the Jordanian people.  The [political] reform project [in response to the Arab Spring] should preserve Jordan’s indigenous identity in the face of the Zionist project...The reform project does not and will not come as part of a resettlement deal [of Palestinians in Jordan].”

On the same day, the Jordanian daily ad-Dustour was even more frank.  It said that “confronting these manifest and hidden schemes can only be achieved by giving prominence to the voice that demands the ‘right of return’...The louder the voice of the ‘right of return’, the more the suspect voices that seek solutions for the problems of the [Palestinian] diaspora, the refugees, and the right to self-determination in Jordan, will be stifled.”

The same commentary went on to argue that as ‘Plan-A’ – that is negotiations with Israel – had failed, it was time for ‘Plan-B’, which it said should be “a new common strategy based on the renewal of the Palestinian national movement, launching a popular resistance, and building on the results and achievements of the Arab Spring.”

What this suggests is that Israel now faces a lose-lose situation in Jordan.  If the forces unleashed by the Arab Spring triumph in Jordan, it will mean greater power and influence to the largely Palestinian-supported Islamic Action Front (IAF), the local branch of the Muslim Brotherhood.  If these forces are resisted by native Jordanians, seeking to maintain their historic privileges in the face of Palestinian demographic pressures, it will be by reinvigorating the enthusiasm of Jordan’s Palestinians for the struggle against Israel and their ‘right of return’ to the West Bank and even Israel proper.