A few people have asked me how locals feel about the political unrest across the Middle East. I want to start by saying the sentiment differs enormously between Jordan and Egypt. I have written an article for a newspaper in Australia about what’s going on in Egypt after managing to interview a few people so won’t comment on the Egypt perspective any further until it’s published.
The only way in which the uprisings have affected me directly was when I was deciding how to fill two extra days. I wanted to spend one day in Syria and then a day in Lebanon, or go to Israel and Palestine. Because many Muslim countries won’t accept passports with Israeli stamps and carefully check exit stamps from neighbouring countries this was going to be all too hard, so Syria it was. Throughout the week as things became more grim there, the three borders between Syria and Jordan closed, one at a time, quite unexpectedly. Not being able to go into Syria also meant I couldn’t go to Lebanon because to get there overland you either have to go through Syria or Israel.
(Having been under a dictatorship for decades surely the Syrians could have waited just a couple more months to start protesting ... But good luck to them.)
For context, most of the people I've spoken to in Jordan are Palestinian. There are about 2.5 million Palestinians living in Jordan (nearly half its total population), 1.5 million in Syria and Lebanon, and 3.5 million in actual Palestine. I haven’t met many native Jordanians because they don’t hold the lowly-paid tourism and hospitality jobs. So what I’ve heard from people is definitely skewed.
My Palestinian driver says he isn’t sure why the Syrians are protesting because he thinks they have it pretty good across the border. Though he might be trying to appease me because I’m cranky I can’t go there.
He can however understand why the Libyans, Tunisians and Yeminis weren’t happy and warns the same could happen in Saudi. He says it’s not about democracy but the difference between Shiite and Sunni Islam, and how the Koran is interpreted by dictators and applied to everyday life. I’m pretty sure no western media outlet has picked this up and I doubt it’s the way Obama (with a carefully typed ‘b’) wants to see it.
I had assumed many of the Palestinians here would be anti-Israel and the US, but not at all. Many have said they welcome people from all countries to Jordan but it’s the politicians who are bad. Interestingly, I’ve been told a few times that Osama bin Laden was not involved in 9/11 at all, that it was a conspiracy between Israel and the US. People here are definitely divided on their feelings about Osama’s death.
Compared to its neighbours, Jordan has been relatively peaceful. There were some protests a few weeks ago but the King obviously registered what was going on around him and decided a bit of leniency was in order. He agreed to drop taxes a bit and look into food prices which calmed people down, but I don’t think there have been any actual changes as yet.
One thing I’ve noticed which seems to be consistent across dictatorships is an abundance of hero-esque photographs of the dear leader. In every shop window, inside homes, on street corners and highway billboards there is a picture of King Abdullah II. There are about four themes: wearing his heavily decorated army uniform; laughing in a suit meeting with western dignitaries; looking serious in his Arab headdress with other dictators; relaxing with his family all of whom are wearing smart, casual western clothing... in an array of poses intended for the diverse audiences who travel through the kingdom of Jordan.
In fairness to him, the King must be an excellent diplomat, given he has to share borders with some of the least desirable rulers on this planet – Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Israel, Syria and Egypt (not a border per se but there’s not much distance between them). Most of his neighbours are not only armed with nuclear power but subscribe to vastly different religious and political philosophies, yet somehow he manages to keep them all on side.
I’ve asked a lot of people here what they think of the King and they claim to love him. Granted the roads are excellent, everyone has mobile phones and cars of some description, there are plenty of tourists and subsequent jobs, and very few visible homeless people. The standard of living seems to be pretty good. However, you have to wonder what's really going on when no one is prepared to say a bad word about him.
I think the Arab Spring is far from over.
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