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Jordan Relations with Israel
In 1989 Jordan still refrained from establishing diplomatic
relations with Israel. The absence of formal relations
notwithstanding, the two countries had cooperated directly or
indirectly since 1967 in a multiplicity of matters pertaining to
the West Bank, the Israeli-occupied territory whose Palestinian
population retained Jordanian citizenship until 1988. Hussein's aim
was to maintain influence and eventually regain control of the West
Bank, a goal that had not been realized by 1988, when he renounced
Jordan's claim to sovereignty of the area. Hussein's ambitions were
frustrated by Israel's unwillingness to negotiate seriously any
withdrawal from the West Bank and by the increasing popularity of
the PLO. As early as 1974, Israel's refusal to consider a United
States-mediated disengagement agreement with Jordan, similar to the
ones that had then been concluded with Egypt and Syria, weakened
Hussein's image as a leader who could recover occupied Arab land.
Israel's refusal also helped to strengthen pan-Arab support for the
PLO's claim to represent West Bank Palestinians. Later that year,
Arab heads of state meeting in a summit conference in Rabat,
Morocco, agreed to recognize the PLO's right to establish an
independent state in the West Bank once the latter was liberated
from Israel.
Although Hussein paid lip service to the 1974 Rabat decision,
he continued to hope Jordan would recover the West Bank. His hopes
were nurtured by Israel's refusal to deal with the PLO. To maximize
Jordan's political leverage from the new situation, Hussein pursued
simultaneously a highly visible policy of reconciliation with the
PLO and a less perceptible policy of cultivating pro-Hashimite
politicians in the West Bank. The measures intended to preserve
Jordan's traditional links to the West Bank actually were
undertaken with the tacit approval of Israel. These measures
included authorizing the continuation of the long-standing economic
and family ties between the East and West banks under the "open
bridges" policy; continuing payment (until 1988) of salaries to
Palestinian officials on the government payroll before and since
1967; strengthening economic links by increased imports from the
West Bank and by continued extension of development grants and
loans to Palestinian firms in the West Bank; and providing
government guarantees for private Jordanian loans to West Bank
municipalities.
After 1977, when Egypt's President Anwar as Sadat initiated
direct negotiations with Israel that led to a separate peace
agreement (and Egypt's temporary ostracism from the Arab world),
Hussein was unwilling to follow Sadat's lead without prior pan-Arab
acquiescence. Hussein apparently believed that in the absence of
broad Arab support to legitimize any political talks with Israel,
his own rule in the East Bank could be threatened. Consequently, he
refused to participate in the Camp David process and was skeptical
of President Reagan's 1982 proposal for a West Bank "entity" in
association with Jordan. Israel's rejection of the Reagan Plan
provided Hussein the boon of not needing to respond to an
initiative that the Palestinians claimed would deny them genuine
self-determination. Two years later, when Shimon Peres became prime
minister of Israel, in September 1984, he offered to negotiate
directly with Jordan without the participation of the PLO. Hussein
decided the state of pan-Arab politics precluded his consideration
of a "Jordanian option" at that time. Instead, he called for an
international peace conference that would include a joint JordanPLO delegation. Hussein perceived an international forum that
brought together both the United States and the Soviet Union as
well as the principal Arab states and Israel as a protective
umbrella under which he could enter into negotiations with the
Israelis.
Peres, whose Labor Party was willing to consider Israeli
withdrawal from at least part of the West Bank, endorsed Hussein's
idea of an international peace conference in an October 1985 speech
before the United Nations. Subsequently, he initiated secret
meetings with Hussein to discuss procedures for convening such a
conference and ways to finesse the issue of PLO participation.
Peres opposed the presence of the PLO at a possible conference, but
did not object to non-PLO representatives of Palestinians
attending. Hussein was not able to obtain firm Israeli commitments,
however, because Peres's coalition partner, Likud Bloc leader
Yitzhak Shamir, opposed the convening of an international
conference and prevented the government from achieving consensus on
the issue. After Shamir became prime minister in late 1986, Peres,
as foreign minister, continued his diplomatic efforts on behalf of
an international conference. Peres had at least one publicized
meeting with Hussein in London, but he lacked support from his own
government. Hussein, who believed that Peres was interested in
substantive negotiations over the West Bank while Shamir was not,
took the unprecedented step during the Israeli elections of 1988 of
announcing that a Labor Party victory would be better for the peace
process.
Data as of December 1989
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