Islamist Threat Constrains Jordan's Syria Policy
Jordan has been successful in persuading the Obama administration to pay attention to the Islamist threat in Syria.
King Abdullah II is no longer hiding his worries about the fate of post-Assad Syria and the danger of it falling into the hands of Islamists, specifically the Muslim Brotherhood, the king’s discomfort toward whom is locally and regionally well known. American journalist Jeffrey Goldberg wrote in The Atlantic, quoting the Jordanian monarch’s criticism of Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi and Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who are brought together by a background of political Islam. Despite the king’s position stemming from foreign concerns, it also figures into the domestic equation.
These royal concerns are not new. Since the beginning of the Syrian revolution, the Islamist opposition, which represents the greatest political opponent to the regime, has gambled on the revolution's success simultaneously with that of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and Tunisia. This increases the possible direct and indirect gains to be made regarding Jordanian political reform and participation in the political process.
On the other hand, the king has interpreted the situation in Syria as the regime controlling a solid base from military and security institutions and enjoying social support among Alawites. The king was accurate in his assessment, despite American and Western estimations to the contrary. Abdullah II told US President Barack Obama at the end of 2011 that Syria President Bashar al-Assad would stay in power in 2012, a senior Jordanian official informed Al-Monitor.
These conflicting accounts on Syria between the royal palace and the Muslim Brotherhood are strongly reflected in the domestic equation. The Brotherhood laid out seven conditions for participation in the representative elections that were held at the beginning of this year, implicitly seeking a change to the rules of the political game and in a practical sense leading to a marked decrease in the powers of the king and his constitutional, legal and political influence. They boycotted the elections out of protest when these conditions were not met.
