Israel and the Hashemites: A Complex Story with Eran Lerman

0:01 Good afternoon and welcome to the Middle East Forums weekly podcast. I want to thank you all for joining us this afternoon and for your continued support of the critically important work that we do here at MEF. I'm pleased to introduce today's guest, Colonel Iran Lairman of the Israel Defense Forces Reserves, who serves as deputy director of the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security and former Deputy Director for F foreign Policy and International Affairs at the National Security Council in the Israeli Prime's Office. He held senior posts in the IDF military intelligence for over 20 years and also served for eight years as director of the Israel and Middle East Office of the American Jewish Committee. This afternoon, Dr. Laramin will be discussing Israel and the Hessemites, sharing his insights on this complex relationship, its history, and its future. After Aaron's initial remarks, we'll be happy to take any of your questions. So, if you'd like to ask a question, please feel free to use the Q&A function at the bottom of your screens to enter your submission, and I'll do my best to get to as many of your questions as possible. I once again once again ask all of you to please,

1:03 please, please keep your submissions to questions only. If you'd like to post a comment, you can do so at the chat function, but please limit submissions in the Q&A to questions only. Today's podcast is being recorded and will be available for future viewing. So, please do share the link with those in your networks who you think would be interested in learning more on this very important topic. Welcome Erin and thank you for joining us this afternoon. I hand the floor over to you. Thank you. Thank you Lori. Look uh for me the Hashimite connection or relationship is to some extent a personal matter. when it was uh with AJC. Um I actually had the pleasure of uh visiting with a leadership group uh King Abdullah II at his uh at his home, not the palace but the villa outside Aman. And we had a long and fascinating essentially a friendly one. And as we were coming out, I asked his permission to say something personal. Um he was very gracious and I said uh your majesty

2:06 if it had not been for that the Jordanian military 1948 was commanded and led by gentlemen I probably wouldn't be here uh because um let's say that the treatment of prisoners of war by other Arab neighbors of ours has not been uh but my father was a P in Jordan uh for a prolonged period of time and uh taken from the old city of and um I have to say he was treated decently and came home safe and sound nine months later.

2:50 And so that set me uh uh thinking and and learning about the this relationship and the more I knew the uh [clears throat] the more I I appreciate the complexity of this Uh let me put it like this. No relationship in the region is is older and more complex than the one we have with the Hasheite family. As such the uh the family that uh came [clears throat] out of the Mecca, they were the custodians of the two holy places uh for the best part of a thousand years uh under various sovereigns. For hundreds of years, it was Ottoman sovereignty, but they rebelled against the Ottomans during World War I in conjunction with the British intelligence services command in Cairo. We

3:54 many people are familiar with this story due to a famous film Lawrence of Arabia and the Hasheite family led by the Sharif Hussein who was the custodian of of the holy places and his sons Thisel and Abdullah rebelled against the Ottomans and joined the British in the effort to drive the Ottoman Empire out of the Arabic speaking lands. uh of of uh the Ottoman Empire. They were promised in return an Arab kingdom that would extend from their current from what was then the current domain in the Hijaz all the way to what is now the nor the southern border of of Turkey or the northern borders of northern Syria.

4:46 But we know for certain because we uh we've read very carefully, some of us more carefully than others, my late uh professor El Kaduri more than most uh the exchange of letters between the British command uh between the actual commission, high commissioner in Cairo uh Mechmong and uh and the the Sharif Hussein and his sons. And we know that they understood that the land that we call the land of Israel uh which is in British terms was called Palestine and some Arabs have picked this term and started using it didn't use it before Philistine that land was excluded from the promise to the Hashemites and they knew it. How do we know that they knew it? Because in December in in in uh January 1919 as the uh peace conference that we know as Versailles that was actually taking

5:50 place in Paris was underway uh Lawrence arranged for the leader of the Zionist movement to meet and and and negotiate with Prince Fiser the most prominent of the two sons and sign an agreement. And this agreement speaks very clearly of two national entities. It doesn't speak of states specifically with two national entities living side by side, the Jewish one and and it even encourages close Jewish settlement on the land and the Arab kingdom that was to come. So had the file vitzman agreement been allowed to stand the entire history of the region the entire history of the conflict could have been very very but the this was a three-way game

6:53 unfortunately there were promises to the Jews there were promises to the Arabs they were not contradictory common to what you may read all over the place they were not contradictory but there was a contradictory promise made to the that they would dominate Syria and Lebanon. The the lines were drawn by two mid-level officials, Mier Gor Pico. People refer to him very often just as Pico and um and and Christopher Sykes.

7:28 It's known as the Sykes Pico agreement. uh it was uh uh secretly concluded uh during the war and it promised France a prominent position in the northern parts of northern northwestern parts of this Arab domain and Fisal ended up being driven out of by the French who created uh their own mandatory system in Syria and Lebanon.

8:01 carved Lebanon out of Syria, carved Syria up into several pieces which later reunited, drove the Hashimmites out and of course that made the the the letter the agreement the the the words of the agreement defunct nar as they say in French and and by the way Fis said this right from the beginning if my the promises to me will not be kept I will not be bound by this agreement What happened is that the British in order to compensate gave fison the kingdom of Iraq. This artificial creature of Kurds, Sunnis and Shia which even today as the last American soldier has left is eering con constantly on on the edge of an abyss. It was created in order to compensate FISA for the humiliation of he suffered at the hands of the French. And by the way, Vitzman and King Fisel of Iraq remained in in in

9:05 contact exchange letters remained on friendly terms to his last day to f to to Fiser's last day in the 30s. The other son Abdullah was given and again as compensation by an act of of the uh of the col of of uh um colonies uh Churchill Winston uh colonial secretary the eastern part of what was at the time considered the British mandatory the land of Israel on its eastern part, what we call Jordan today, gave it to King to at the time Prince Abdullah as a a prince uh a princely holding an which later in 1946 became a kingdom, an independent kingdom.

10:07 Even then and and as you know some elements in the Zionist movement resented this and uh for years the line of the Jaboteski movement was that we have the there are two banks to the Jordan and both are ours and that that act uh was a betrayal of of the British But we uh over time of course we came to accept uh the Hashimite presence on that side of the of the river and build a relationship.

10:45 Uh there were regular contacts. Um Israeli Zionist leaders met with Abdullah. He was uh medically treated by Jewish doctors in Jerusalem. Um [clears throat] and uh in 1946 for example when Benorian now the uh dominant figure in in the Zalist movement in in the Yishu in the pre-state uh situation wanted to persuade President Truman that he should support the Jew a Jewish state. to support an end to the British mandate and a a Jewish state. And he knew that Truman would not support a the total annexation of all of the land of Israel west of the river into the Jewish state. So he on the basis of contacts with Abdullah, he

11:49 put formally before the Americans through a letter to Judge Frankfurt plan to divide western land of the western land of Israel between what he called uh Judea at the time the third and the name Israel was not yet used and Abdelah. Abdelah, that is to say King Abdullah's domain, King Abdullah's kingdom. And I have to say the lines that he drew, the approximate lines that he drew were very close to what we ended up with uh after the bitter war of 1948.

12:31 And he believed that at the time based on contacts that Gulame mayor and others had with Abdullah that the Hashemites would consent to this partition and to the creation of the Jewish state and establish peace with it. The Hashemites and the Zionist movement had a common The common enemy was Hajamin Husseini, the Palestinian leader who has spent the war under Hitler's uh uh opices in Berlin, fulminating against the Jews, arranging for participation of his Muslim troops in the extermination of European jewelry, encouraging Hitler to go on and on in constant touch with This is the man who came back and and and was from and from Cairo was planning to dominate the Palestinian struggle.

13:34 And of obviously he was an enemy of both the Zanist movement and of king now King Abdullah the first in Jordan. But uh tragically when gold mayor again went to see Abdullah on the eve of the declaration of independence in May 1948, he with a tone of regret told her that he cannot stay out that the Arab League essentially has determined was determined to go to war and Jordan will not day out. It was almost heartbreaking for Golden Mayor. She came back quite distraught. Uh but there was nothing that could be done about this. And indeed the Jordanian military which was the most effective of all Arab armies uh the good the Etsion block and uh its Jew some of its Jews were slaughtered by the

14:38 locals and then many taken prisoner and uh two weeks later it subdued the Jewish quarter in Jerusalem where my father was one of the fighters and uh and many were taken prisoner and the city was ended up being divided for the next 19 years. They conquered uh the areas which later came to be called the west bank, that is to say the west bank of Jordanian control west of the river.

15:11 But by October 48 uh the two militaries uh the commander the Jordanian commander in Jerusalem Abdalatal and the Israeli commander late of great fame Mushe Dian came to an agreement basically on stabilizing the situation in the city. And here I want to say something quite radical. I think Benorian preferred to see Jerusalem divided between him and Abdullah rather than even if Israel at the time would have conquered it, it stood the risk of being forced to abandon the whole of Jerusalem which under the UN partition plan was designed to be a corpus separat not part of the Jewish state, an internationally managed city or some some such fantasy.

16:02 uh we accepted the 48 partition 47 partition plan but this was the most absurd part of it and Bengorian certainly wanted to retain as the capital of Israel the Jewish parts the densely populated Jewish parts of Jerusalem which at the time constituted almost one quarter of the entire issue and so he saw in the partition of the city between Israel and Jordan probably a way out of this trap.

16:36 And uh for for him the most important thing were not the holy places but rather the living functional uh heart of the of the new state which was to be Jewish Jerusalem and um moral this more or less held for 19 years. There were serious talks about peace going on. Uh there were there constant contacts and then is Dian and others went to talk to to Abdullah to obtain the release of the prisoners of war, my father included.

17:20 And uh by 1950 there was a serious discussion about the possibility of peace between the kingdom of Jordan and and and Israel. But then Abdullah was assassinated on the temple mount by one Hajamin al Husseini's followers. Uh his direct successor King Talal was not in his right mind. And so uh soon a very young man, a boy really came to power, King Hussein, um, and and managed unbelievably to to rule over Jordan for more than 40 years. He came in at the last stages of the Truman administration and he died of cancer, still rather young, uh, in uh, during the the late years of the Clinton administration. That should gives you give you a sense of of of the of this uh man and his achievement. Uh in a in a

18:23 poor country besieged by radical regimes like Syria after after 1958 is actually part of Egypt. Iraq falls into the hands of murderous radicals who butchered the Hasheite family in 1958. uh his the Saudis hate him because they conquered the hij from his his greatgrandfather from the Sharif Hussein and they will never forgive the Hashemites what they did to the Hashemites if if you know how that works. And so the he's besieged from all over uh by friendly Arab countries. Uh he used to say to his Israeli interlocutors, you know, you are lucky you have enemies. I am surrounded by Uh, King Hussein used to and as of 1963 onwards he established his own channel of communication with the Israeli Sadly, in 1967, he could not resist the pressure to be drawn into the war. I've

19:29 heard speculation that maybe he wanted the war in order to get rid of all these Palestinians who were becoming a nuisance. I think that's a a conspiracy theory, but he certainly could not resist the pressure from NASA and the Syrians and others to be drawn into a war which he probably uh had a sober assessment as to what may happen. But um they I have to say both in 48 and in ' 67 the Jordanians fought well and fought honorably. Um, Israelis paid their respects in a sense. Uh, I don't know if you know the story in the fiercest battle in Jerusalem itself, uh, ammunition the battle on ammunition um, we had quite a number of Israeli But after the battle was over and a makeshift uh burial was made also for the Jordanians who fell there and Israeli put up a sign that here lie 53

20:33 brave Jordanian soldiers. I've never seen this in our history before or So uh as of as of that point uh um Jordan became um lost the West Bank and became the target of the Palestinian effort to take it over and turn it into a base of operations. The Palestinians were very much impressed and and and and let's say influenced by the Vietnamese example during those years of the 60s and early 70s. And they admire they thought that they should turn Jordan into Aman into Hanoi so as to conquer Saigon that's to say Jerusalem. And so they started uh taking control of parts of Jordan. Israel began raids and operations against their bases in Jordan and the Jordanians were drawn in uh

21:38 artillery from Jordan and and and battles with the IDF. It was a very rough period. But then the Palestinians just went too far and in 1970 and this is the turning point for our discussion. In 1970 they tried to take over and King Hussein had enough and basically ordered his military which was purely bedwin background not Palestinian uh to basically destroy the Palestinian organizations on Jordanian soil. The Palestinians called it Black September.

22:17 Uh but we remember this as a decisive turning point for several reasons. Uh it it changed the nature of our relationship with Jordan. It changed the nature of our relationship with the United States because the Israeli willingness to intervene and deter the Syrians from invading or turn them back after they already invaded Jordan in retaliation for this this operation against the Palestinians. Our willingness to to to do this for an American ally. Jordan was always an American ally. The Hashelites were British allies and then they became American allies. Our willingness to do so, to save uh and secure an Arab ally of the West earned us the respect and the and the uh uh uh let's say partnership of the Nixon administration, Henry Kissinger and it made a profound difference from then onwards.

23:22 Since 1970, we've never fought the Not again. Moreover, in 1973, it was King Hussein who came to warn gold mayor that the Syrians are up to no good. I wish she listened. She didn't fully comprehend the danger that he was describing. He did not he was not fully aware of what the Egyptians were up to. But the Syrians, his northern neighbors in he knew and he felt and he he sensed that something is is going in the wrong direction. He came to warn us. That's a remarkable story. It it is being mentioned nowadays again because there are reports of whether or not Israel was warned in 23 by various Arab leaders.

24:13 But in the case of King Hussein, we know this for certain. uh a byproduct uh I don't go without go without going into too much detail. One of the byproducts of this warning was that we did beef up the northern front and and uh which probably saved us from a complete collapse on the Golan. So from then on it was a friendly relationship but as I'm fond of saying uh placed in the most in the densest area of the Middle East under the table. We met we talked King Hussein reportedly used to sit in the streets of Tel Aviv and Ogle the girls in disguise but it was kept secret. It was only after 93, after the Oslo agreements made it legit, that Jordan came out into the open. They had to because in 1999 during the Gulf War, Jordan was obliged under immense Iraqi pressure to side

25:17 with Saddam Hussein against the other Arabs. And so it was in the doghouse in in Washington obviously for being on the wrong side. and Israel was actually helpful in bringing Jordan back into America's favor and and part of it was this Jordanian decision to come into the open and create a peace treat and sign a peace treaty with Israel in 1994 which has held since then. Having said all this, the relationship has its ups and downs. Uh on Jerusalem, the Jordan Israel and Jordan share an interest that it should not fall into Palestinian hands. Axabos which is the last vestage of Hasheite authority in the sense that the Jordanian wak under the terms of the priest treaty the Jordanian uh uh uh ministry of religious affairs so to speak manages the affairs

26:21 of the temple mount for Muslims uh uh under Israeli sovereignty and basically this hold this 10 years hold on on one the last remaining holy place. The others two having other two having been taken from them by the Saudi is important to the Jordanians and and the peace treaty secures this. We have a mutual interest against Islamist terrorism, against Palestinian terrorism, against Iranian subversion. The Jordanians were of help in shooting down some of what the Iranians have been throwing at us in 24 25 and the last conflict. We are trying to help when the they are being attacked. But there are tensions radi radical Israeli voices uh trouble the Jordanians in terms of what they want to do on the temple mount.

27:16 Um the Jordanians cannot ignore the broad sentiment in the Arab world and uh therefore there are tensions. But having said all this, it is one the most side by side with Egypt. It's the most important relationship we have with the Arab world. We have um a fantastic breakthrough with the United Arab Emirates, but Jordan has our longest border and the relationship must be sustained and maintained and we should avoid a friction as best we can.

27:57 Thank you so much, Iran. That was such a thorough uh summary of the of a very complicated history and uh I appreciate you going through all that. We do have just a a couple minutes left. I'm going to uh ask a couple of the questions that the audience has posed. Um there's a a British international lawyer who was at Oxford with King Abdullah and taught the first university course there on Israel Jordanian legal relations who was asked as King Abdullah's heir is half Palestinian and has been very critical of Israel is there a possibility that he will abandon their peace treaty most of the Jordanian population currently wants this and a a different person also asked about um the population of Jordan being uh 70% Palestine Palestinian Inian, excuse me. Is there anything to that?

28:43 And what does all that mean? Quite frankly, I think the Palestinians in Jordan know what has befallen their brethren on on the other side of the river because of Hamas and in the case of those who live in the West Bank because of the corruption and dysfunction of the Palestinian Authority. And how eager are they to actually go the same way? I I I don't know, but I think that their uh dominant elements, the prosper prosperous, relatively prosperous middle class of Palestinians in Jordan have no wish to see their own life lives going down the same sinkhole and uh and uh had had they been more uh active, things could have been different. But we don't see this. Uh well there there are boycots of uh Israeli lawyers and in business and so on but the Jordanian government lives uh by Israeli help when

29:47 it comes to water. It has uh been willing to walk work with the Emirates in Israel on on energy. uh we ultimately have so much interest in common that I don't think that uh the young prince when he ever comes to power uh would would uh change course. Uh so so I wanted to pose a question to you as I'd love to hear your thoughts on the possible impact of the Mecca agreement which um was a topic of an MAF podcast about a month ago and you wrote in a recent article that uh quote closer relations between Jordan and the regime in Damascus could also lead to growing Turkish influence as part of the Mecca's efforts to expand the circle of participating Sunni states. So um is there a chance that Jordan would slip into a Turkish alliance?

30:37 Well, I think the the the danger was there because the Jordanians were let's say trying to be friendly with the new regime in Damascus. But the recent meeting and the encouraging thing is that the recent meeting in the Emirates brought again the traditional elements of the camp of stability in the region, Israel included, um in a way that indicated that um the the old concerns about Islamist terrorism and Islamist subversion still override the uh the let's say temptations of the Turkish connection. So Saudi the Saudis came and the Amiratis hosted and the Jordanis and the Egyptians were there. Uh the Moroccans the and and the prime minister of Israel happened to be there on the same day. This is not uh uh this is we lost your sound.

31:48 I can't hear you. Okay, I can hear you now. We lost your sound, I think. Okay, I said could be my end. Okay, the Jordanians were there. Uh, interestingly enough, the Egyptians, the Moroccans were on very close terms with Israel. I think the the the uh Houthi achievements on the ground were a wakeup call and and and basically indicating that the Turkish fantasy uh does not deliver for Jordan or for Saudi Arabia. So that I think could could be a turning point. We don't know yet. Let's put it like this.

32:27 Uh, someone asked whether it would benefit Israel to acknowledge and promote that Jordan was created in 1922 to be the Arab state. Um, and that their their point being that Israel doesn't really make that um, distinction. Well, some people believe in this notion. You know, Jordan is Palestine, therefore Palestine is not Palestine. um it will not solve our problem uh because it will whatever happens it will not change the situation on the ground where Palestinian people live. Um and um it could help and some Israelis make that argument if the Jordanians would be more willing to bring their governance which is far more effective uh into uh uh parts of the West Bank where the Palestinian Authority is fairly dysfunctional. This idea has been

33:29 recently promoted by somebody on the clearly on the Israeli center right. Um I think the Jordanians would be very reluctant right now to get involved. They have enough trouble on their hands as it is managing in a rough very rough neighborhood. But uh the the idea basically uh that uh you know by declaring that Jordan is Palestine we resolve we the Palestinian problem uh I think belongs to uh to the realm of of fantasy unfortunately.

34:05 Um, so I also wanted to hear your thoughts on any threat that Hamas may pose to Jordan, whether from Judea and Samaria or otherwise. And is the kingdom concerned about Hamas from the standpoint of regional stability generally? Is it concerned about a poorest border between what you know is known as the West Bank and and Jordan? Um, and you had stated in an article, I'm going to quote you, tyrron attaches particular importance to destabilizing Jordan so that it can turn the West Bank into a second Gaza. What are your thoughts on all of that?

34:39 Well, the Jordanians are very, very well aware of it, have been aware of this for a generation now. If Iran wants to penetrate the West Bank the way they've been able to penetrate Gaza through the political void that existed in Sinai for many years uh because the Egyptians couldn't care less about what was going on in Sinai unfortunately uh they need to destabilize the Jordanian regime but the Jordanian regime is not easily destabilized. They have a very effective security establishment. They have failures from time to time. We had terrorist attacks uh by deranged individuals and dangerous individuals coming across the border. Uh but at the end of the day they have been very very effective and if you go across the border you see that their their gunpoints are pointed inwards to prevent any such penetration from Jordan into Israel. Um they know the consequences.

35:37 They don't have any wish to see a return to the crazy 70s. or or 60s, sorry. The one point is I think that in their heart of hearts, although I you know they they will never say so, they prefer Israel to stay on the banks of the Jordan on the Jordan River that the Jordan Valley should remain under Israeli security control. Sovereignty is an open question, but security control must remain Israeli for Jordan to be safe and not to become a very inviting target for Thank you so much. Unfortunately, we have run out of time. We've kept everybody over a little bit, but what a what a thorough uh background on on the relationship and and I appreciate you joining us, Iron. We'll have to have you back in the future to discuss this as the things develop in the region. Um, thank you to everybody for joining us this afternoon. I hope you can join us on Wednesday at 3 PM with uh Ashley

36:40 Perry for Israel Insider. And again, Aron, thank you for for joining. You're very welcome.