Jordan has appointed a new ambassador to Israel to replace its previous envoy, who had been absent from his post for two years before recently retiring.
اضافة اعلان
However, the new ambassador has not been dispatched, just as Israel's ambassador to Jordan is also not currently present in the Kingdom. At this stage, neither envoy appears likely to assume their diplomatic duties.
Israel continues to pose a range of challenges to Jordan. Although technical and logistical coordination between the two countries remains in place, political relations are at their lowest point in years.
Tel Aviv continues to exert pressure on Jordan through various means at times over water, at others through natural gas supplies, restrictions on border crossings, the mining and fortification of the Jordan–Palestine border, the construction of security barriers, increased Israeli military deployments near Jordan, and confidential political conditions imposed on Amman across multiple issues, often without public acknowledgment.
These pressures come amid an increasingly volatile situation along Jordan's western flank. Two days ago, I wrote an article in Al Ghad titled "Collapse in the West Bank," describing what I viewed as the near-total deterioration of daily life for Palestinians in the occupied West Bank.
That article preceded the latest incursions into Al-Aqsa Mosque the largest of their kind, led by an Israeli minister and carried out without regard for Jordan's custodianship as well as the events in the village of Tell near Nablus, which reflected an escalation of Israeli military and settler actions in the West Bank.
In my view, this escalation is likely to intensify in the coming period and could push instability eastward.
These are not media exaggerations. Jordan's Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ayman Safadi, stated on X that the Israeli government is pushing the West Bank toward an explosion.
He said that Israel's violations of the historical and legal status quo at Jerusalem's holy sites are illegal actions and dangerous provocations that could drive the region toward another catastrophic conflict, the consequences of which would extend far beyond the occupied Palestinian territories.
From a strategic perspective, Jordan is passing through one of the most sensitive periods in its modern history.
It is surrounded by crises on every side: Palestine to the west, Syria to the north, instability to the south and the possibility of developments involving Lebanon, Iraq to the east and its proximity to Iran, alongside concerns over Gulf security, threats to shipping lanes, energy supplies, oil, exports and imports, maritime traffic, port operations, and the movement of goods.
It is as though Jordan finds itself at the center of a region whose foundations are steadily unraveling, while the possibility of a devastating regional war looms over everyone.
This is an exceptionally delicate moment. Yet the greatest danger, in my assessment, is Israel's attempt to exploit the broader regional turmoil to reshape the situation in Jerusalem and the West Bank in ways that could fundamentally alter the status quo.
This could include implementing policies that lead to the forced displacement of Palestinians.
Israeli settlers have openly called for the expulsion of Palestinians from the West Bank, reinforcing concerns that pressure related to the territory could increasingly be shifted onto Jordan through a succession of crises, placing growing political and humanitarian burdens on the Kingdom.
This raises an unavoidable question: What should Jordan do in the coming period? What is its strategy for dealing with such a scenario? Some have previously described such developments as constituting a declaration of war not as political rhetoric, but as a description of the situation should Israel move further in implementing these plans. At that point, Jordan would face two difficult choices: direct confrontation, with all its costs, or avoiding confrontation, which, in the author's view, could prove even more costly.
Ultimately, Jordan's greatest source of resilience lies in its domestic unity, while relying on security guarantees from Washington offers little certainty.
Israel is prepared to destabilize the wider region in pursuit of its objectives in Jerusalem and the West Bank.
The risks facing Jordan are therefore not diminishing but increasing day by day.
At the same time, the official Palestinian leadership, Palestinian society, and the various Palestinian factions also bear a fundamental responsibility in confronting policies that primarily target the Palestinians and, by extension, Jordan.
