There were many headlines that came out of the recent interview conducted by a Syrian satellite channel with President Bashar al-Assad. Some focused their attention on his escalation against Turkey's leaders, and this is not new, while others emphasized his warning to the West about al-Qaeda, which is also not new. As for the fact that he ignored Lebanon, this did not deviate much from an old and well-known policy. But the issue that was indeed the center-stage of the interview was his explicitly negative remarks about Jordan. What is new here is the new Jordanian stance itself, in terms of Jordan's participation, in some way or another, in the Syrian conflict. The conflict has spilled over from the Syrian border, which is now extremely porous. This is something that Jordan, a weak, poor, and small country, cannot bear. Jordan lives in fear of al-Qaeda and its ilk, which have left their bloody footprint in Amman's hotels. Indeed, it is feared that extremist groups will seek to fill the vacuum left by Bashar al-Assad's departure, if not in the whole of Syria, then in parts of it. Jordan also lives in fear of the Syrian refugees remaining on its soil, and of further influx of Syrians as its modest economy has a limited capacity to cope with commitments related to the refugees. Furthermore, after the strike against the facility near Damascus, Jordan legitimately fears that Israel, concerned that advanced weaponry may fall into the hands of extremists, might intervene in Syria as Benjamin Netanyahu hinted at a few days ago. This is not to mention Jordanian – and non-Jordanian – fears over the prospects of the Syrian regime using its chemical weapons. This estimate is reinforced by the leaks about the presence of U.S. troops in Jordan, regardless of their actual number, and reports about weapons flowing to Syria from Jordan that some linked to preparations for the critical battle for Damascus. Also relevant in this vein is the importance assigned by some observers to the successive meetings between US President Barack Obama and King Abdullah II. What is odd, therefore, is not for Jordan to get involved in the Syrian crisis, one way or the other. What is odd is for Jordan's involvement to have been thus delayed. Indeed, if the stance on Syria is a cause for disputes among the Lebanese, it is cause for reinforcing national consensus among the Jordanian. If we recall the bad relationship between the throne and the Islamic bloc in Jordan, it becomes possible for us to remember the 1980s, when the position on the Iraq-Iran war allowed a common ground to be found between the regime and the Jordanian Muslim Brotherhood. So will something of the sort be repeated vis-à-vis the Syrian conflict? Bear in mind that the position opposed to Syrian tyranny is immeasurably morally superior to the position that supported, at the time, Iraqi tyranny. We put forward this assessment while being aware of the nature of the foreign policy pursued by Amman, which is closely linked to the nature of the economy that has limited resources and capacities. To be sure, Jordan, which lies at the heart of the major Arab crises, is close to Palestine, Israel, Syria, and Iraq, and by extension, Iran. Jordan cannot remain outside of Arab or even Western consensus, let alone when the two consensuses converge and almost merge together. Jordan, which has since the 1950s become adept at extracting opportunities for life from the clenches of impossibility, cannot keep itself in a deadly position of a spectator to what is happening in Syria, and in violation of both consensuses. So it would only render the assessment more valid if the hypothesis that says that a major Palestinian prize awaits Abdullah II is proven true – without President Mahmoud Abbas being far from presenting it. The same hypothesis purports that all this is closely linked to what U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry is about to initiate soon.
