A Stairway to Paradise: A Palestinian/Jordanian Union

Analysts are comparing Monday's White House meeting between President Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to a new couple's first dance. The duo went out of its way to avoid stepping on each other's toes and walked off the floor smiling broadly to the public. But O & N were far from mutually infatuated. Obama failed to warn about a military option if Tehran continues nuclear weapons development, and Netanyahu spoke about "immediate negotiations" with the Palestinians, but fell short of agreeing to Obama's impassioned call for a two state peace formula.

We're bound to be seeing more fancy two-way Terpsichore in the months to come.

One way up the stairway to Mideast paradise might be by reviving some old steps rather than tapping to ones that are certain to trip us up.

Take for example the idea that the long festering Israel-Palestine sore can be cured by simply establishing an independent Palestinian state. That might have worked a long time ago but the Palestinians have rejected it whenever it was offered and today they are so economically bereft and so politically divided between the PLO of Mahmoud Abbas and the Hamas rejectionists of Gaza that the idea of a viable unified Palestinian state is all but doomed to failure.

The answer may not be in establishing a tiny politically unworkable, economically unsustainable demilitarized Palestinian state, but by forming one that exists in federation with neighboring Jordan. That idea has been around for years and often only whispered - or laughed at as it was when I broached it in a column of mine some years ago. But a few Palestinian, Israeli and Jordanian opinion makers are now beginning to talk cautiously again about renewing the so-called "Jordanian option": the establishment of an autonomous West Bank/Gaza Palestinian province/state linked politically, economically and even militarily to the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan.

Israeli political scientist Michael Bar-Zohar even proposed the idea recently in an op-ed column in the influential Jerusalem Post. A former Knesset member and the official biographer of both Israeli founding father David Ben-Gurion and current President Shimon Peres, Bar-Zohar points out that the total area of the West Bank is 2,270 square miles, less than half the size of Los Angeles county! A third of that paltry plot is desolate desert. "Does anybody believe that that this tiny slice of territory, sandwiched between Israel and Jordan will provide enough living space for the local 2.4 million Palestinians" - not to mention the millions of Palestinian refugees who supposedly want to return to a Palestinian homeland?

Bar-Zohar also points out that the mostly arid Gaza Strip - which is separated from the West Bank by a sizable stretch of Israeli territory - is a mere 141 square miles with 1.5 million Palestinians already living there. "Those who want to give them a decent chance in life", suggests Bar Zohar, will have to transfer good numbers of them to the West Bank. Would it be able "to absorb yet another million Palestinians on its poor, arid territory?"
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Bar-Zohar's solution "goes far beyond the childish two state approach." He proposes a regional solution that would involve Jordan and possibly even Egypt. Jordan would federate itself with the West Bank. Egypt - which borders Gaza - would ideally involve itself by giving Gazans land to develop in the vast, empty spaces of Northern Sinai.

Linking Jordan and the West Bank would not be for the first time. The Hashemite Kingdom itself was carved out of the Palestine Mandate which originally included all of what is now Israel, Gaza, the West Bank and Transjordan. Jordan's legendary Arab Legion seized the entire West Bank during Israel's 1948 War of Independence (Egypt took the Gaza Strip). For 19 years, Jordan's King Hussein firmly ruled the West Bank as part of his kingdom (there was never talk of an independent West Bank Palestinian state back in those days).. During the 1967 Six-Day War, the Jordanian monarch foolishly listened to Egypt's Gamal Nasser and attacked Israel. The IDF promptly defeated the Jordanian forces and raised the blue & white flag over the West Bank.

Even then, King Hussein left his West Bank options open, claiming a "special relationship" as the official guardian of the al Aqsa Mosque and Jerusalem's other Muslim holy places. Jordan also became home to more than 1.6 million Palestinian refugees and was one of the only Arab states to ever allow Palestinians to become equal citizens. Today, more than 60% of Jordan's population is of Palestinian origin -- including the kingdom's elegant young queen, Rania.

Jordan's Palestinian welcome mat has not been problem-free. During the 1970s, Yasser Arafat's Palestine Liberation Organization became such a threat to the Hashemite king that Hussein launched a deadly counterattack, forcing Arafat and his band to retreat from Jordan.

Eventually, the late Hussein grew weary of Palestinian whining and manipulating. I was one of the foreign correspondents at the Hashemite palace in 1988 when he announced that he was "divorcing" the West Bank. The Palestinians would be on their own.

Hussein's son, the young King Abdullah, has never been as interested in the West Bank as his father once was. But Abdullah increasingly warns of a major new Mideast war if the Arab-Israeli conflict is not settled. And he is also said to understand that the Palestinians are presently incapable of ruling themselves. No doubt he doesn't want the Palestinians pushing him and his family out of their jobs. But he is believed to have taken a renewed interest in the West Bank and in finding a fail safe way to play a role there.

A Jordanian-West Bank union, in which some Palestinians loyal to the king could even serve in the Jordanian forces, may be just that. It will take US initiative. Why not offer financial compensation to West Bankers and Gazans willing to to move to unsettled parts of Jordan? Why not a border with Israel secured in part by Jordan? Why not a Palestinian West Bank and Gaza linked to Jordan with an economic union that bonds both to Israel's burgeoning economy?

Anything would be better than existing options offer the Palestinians: more bloodshed, more corruption, more hatred, more suffering for all sides.

Comments

[brady01]

What a lot of people often forget is that from 1948-1967 the West Bank was part of Jordan, and the Gaza Strip was part of Egypt. The whole concept of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza is an akward amalgamation of the fundamentalist fantasy of Palestinian control from the river to the sea, and the more moderate idea of Israel giving up the West Bank and Gaza for peace.
The West Bank and Gaza are not a country, never have been a country, and its hard to imagine how they could become a unified country in the near future. Chesnoff's idea is an intruiging one in that it ends the occupation of these lands while ensuring they won't fall into the hands of rocket-shooting fundamentalists.

[Gary Tucker]

I also believe that any solution to the conflict/refugee crisis should involve Jordan. But it is not enough to just cobble Palestinian territories to Jordan and be done. Is a combined Jordan/Palestine currently in any position to absorb the needs of 10 million displaced? Just enlarging the "aid" pool is no solution. Refugees in other countries must be also addressed. Enough is not being considered of what Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Syria and Lebanon should be willing to "give up" to create a viable homeland for Jordanians­/Palestini­ans/Iraqi refugees. The current boundaries for West Bank and Gaza, even with "minor" adjustments, are just not ever going to work. Lack of defense, water, sustainability and the notion of two winners from any such current solution cannot be ignored. A much more comprehensive solution is needed. This involves the Northern West Bank remaining permanently within the State of Israel. This involves the newly formed premise of not the right of return, but of the right not to leave (for both sides). From the Arab point of view this also involves the giving of parts of their territory to the creation of a much more viable regional Jordanian/­Palestinia­n/Arab homeland. These countries donating land and/or water compact treaties are Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Syria and Lebanon, i.e. Israel giving the Golan not to Syria, but to Jordan/Palestine for a Syrian/Lebanese long term water development in the Litani/Jor­dan/Yarmou­k basin. palestineroad35topeace.blogspot.com

[mommamia526]

Having Federations with Jordan and Egypt would give the Palestinians some level of independence, together with the support and protection of two working nations, with established governments and military institutions. It would for them be a giant step forward. Hamas could strive to be part of the Egyptian government, or decide to be separate. In any case, with Hezbullah in Lebanon, the PA part of Jordanian government, there would be some hope of improvement for these populations, and the push/pulling for the upper hand and power of these separate factions would be over. It should lead to stabilization, as opposed to the continuous fragmentation we now have. IF, as Mr. Obama suggested and asked for, Arab nations would open opportunities for Israel to have embassies, fly-over rights and the ability to establish trade in the area that could only lead to improvement for everyone. Lots of desert, for example, that might be changed into arable land if the possibilities to do so exist. Israel has experience with scientific development in that area.

[mommamia526]

More is going on in the ME than the Israel/PA dynamics. There is also the push of Iran to enlarge its influence in the area, and preferably dominate. Iranians are Persians, not Arabs. The support of Iran for the *Palestinians* may result from any number of considertions. The creation of a third Palestinian entity, with possibly another one after the elections in Lebanon - if Hezbullah wins, as is expected, there will be four - and displacement will increase and prolong flux in the area. Palestinians say they want to integrate other Palestinians from all over the ME. Iraq has expelled many *Palestinians* some two year ago. We see in other arreas, now in Paklstan how such massive displacement causes an increase in unrest, and no resolutions are available. The displacement of Israelis from Gaza has also not yet been fully resolved. Reports are that many are still homeless. Apparently the Jenin model of training of PA military personnel in Jordan was part of the discussion on Monday. That would become a ready part of the military federation with Jordan. Egypt could do the same thing. The writer of this blog has hit the solution on its head. This is the only viable solution.

[Henry]

It appears to me that the Bibi group is tactfully arranging for an Iran episode that will bring the USA military into the protection of the Israeli state approved post WW2 by the U.N. (the one the republicans hate so much). The press will be valiant in support of the military. Hundreds of thousands will die. Iraq will be joined at the hip by a "pacified" Iran. An an American president will pronounce that he or she would like to see a "secular" deomcracy take place in the former Iran. It's in our future at some point. The question is whether the U.S.A. will be stupid enough to be involved. (I'm afraid to say that we all know the answer to that)

[mommamia526]

I have posted similar opinions on this website. It came out of logic for me, and practicallity, rather than ideology and knowledge of historical data as this writer presents them. Apparently, as we speak, there is yet another flare-up between the PA and Hamas, they refused to work together on a coalition government for a few days already, and today I read that there are accusations that Hamas stole medical aid, ambulances, and sold them. Another accusation is that competent medical practioners were replaced by Hamas members and that as a result many people died. Be that as it may, who can ascertain that as fact, cooperation between those two parties is not likely. Then there is the other impractical fact that Israel will be disected, that at some point Israel will only be 7 miles, I believe, wide, that Iran has far ranging missiles, and that both Hezbullah and Hamas had already bragged about their resulting powers because of that.