Jordan: Like Father like Son

Jordanian King Abdullah released today a statement saying that Israel will not be able to exist without peace with the Palestinians. He also criticized Israel's unilateral withdrawal from the Gaza strip a year ago. These statements represnt his fears from facing the Palestinians on his own. More than anything these statements prove that the king is more similar to his father than previously thought.

The late King Hussein was in a hurry to sign the peace treaty with Israel soon after the Oslo accords. As Dennis Ross indicated in his book, the king feared a looming Israeli-Palestinian agreement after that which would set the borders between Israel and the PA; and leave him to face the Palestinians on his own. It did not happen. The Palestinians fambled the best opportunity they had in years in Camp David 2000 and the risk of a looming agreement was no where to be seen as the Al-Aqsa Intifada began to take shape. King Abdullah could rest... or so he thought.

King Abdullah did not seem at first to people as different from his father. Like his father he was in no rush to get into a conflict with Israel as trade and peace were much more lucrative. However the disengagement enacted by Sharon reignited old fears. Once again a Jordanian king was facing the possibility of having to face the Palestinians on his own. No peace treaty, no matter how lucrative is worth this from their point of view. And so King Abdullah began to release these warnings that to some seemed as if taking a different path from that of his father. But in fact it is the same path. It's just that now that the peace between Israel and Jordan is a fact, the tools standing at his disposal to combat the Palestinian issue are much more limited.