BICOM

What happened: The historic peace treaty between Israel and Jordan, signed on October 26, 1994, will mark its 25th anniversary tomorrow. While a pillar of security for both states – as well as Western interests – in a volatile region, the peace itself remains cold. In recent years, the moribund Israeli-Palestinian peace process and uneasy status quo in the West Bank and Jerusalem have caused tension in bilateral relations.

• Israel and Jordan maintain intimate security and intelligence ties. As pro-Western states they share common threats like Iran, Islamic State, and other jihadist actors. The two militaries cooperate closely on border security and Israel reportedly aided Jordan in staving off Iranian gains in southern Syria. Indeed, it has been Israeli government policy since the 1970s to do whatever it takes to buttress the stability of the Hashemite monarchy in Jordan.
• Direct bilateral economic ties have not blossomed as once hoped. According to recent figures, Israeli exports to Jordan total only $50 – $100 million per year, roughly 0.2 percent of all Israeli goods exports. Jordan’s net exports to Israel stand at $100 million per year, roughly 1.5 percent of the kingdom’s total goods exports. Yet growing trade from the Gulf states to Israel, via Jordan, has seen total Jordanian exports to Israel grow to approximately $400 million per year as of 2017.
• Due to its acute energy needs, Jordan next year is expected to begin importing 45 billion cubic meters of natural gas over the next 15 years from Israel’s Leviathan offshore field. Jordan is also in talks with Israel to double the amount of drinkable water it provides the kingdom from the current 50 million cubic meters per year.
• Politically the peace treaty does not enjoy popular support inside Jordan due primarily to criticism of Israeli policies vis-à-vis the Palestinians. Some Israeli policies in Jerusalem are perceived to have violated the ‘status quo’ and angered Jordan due to the Hashemite monarchy’s special custodianship status over the city’s Muslim holy sites. Israeli settlement expansion – including Benjamin Netanyahu’s election campaign pledge to annex the Jordan valley and apply Israeli sovereignty to settlements – have also caused alarm due to Amman’s longstanding commitment to a two-state solution.

Context: The Israeli-Jordanian peace treaty was only the second peace deal agreed between Israel and a neighbouring Arab state, after Egypt in 1979. Yet public celebration of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Jordanian King Hussein’s 1994 signing ceremony in the Arava desert has been extremely muted.

• The most news the Israel-Jordan treaty generated in recent weeks was the stated intention by Jordan to retrieve two small parcels of border farmland — Baqura/Naharayim and Ghamr/Tzofar) – that were leased to Israel for 25 years as part of the treaty. Negotiations over extending the arrangement were inconclusive, with Jordan portraying it as a reassertion of national sovereignty.
• The Trump administration’s plan for Israeli-Palestinian talks has also caused concern in Jordan, with King Abdullah repeatedly warning that any deviation from long-standing international parameters would be rejected by Amman and threaten regional stability. Abdullah maintains that any resolution to the conflict needs to be based on a two-state solution along the pre-1967 ceasefire lines with East Jerusalem as the capital of a Palestinian state.
• Two security crises in July 2017 further strained Israeli-Jordanian relations: the limiting by Israel of access to Jerusalem’s Haram al-Sharif/Temple Mount after a terrorist attack at the site, and the killing by an Israeli embassy guard in Amman of two Jordanian nationals.
• The most ambitious Israeli-Jordan joint venture – the Red Sea-Dead Sea Conveyance Project – has been stalled for years. In its latest iteration the project would see a desalination plant built in the southern Jordanian city of Aqaba (with water then also exported to Israel and the Palestinian Authority), as well as the remaining brine piped to the evaporating Dead Sea.

Looking ahead: The Israeli-Jordanian peace treaty is a major strategic imperative for both countries and has successfully weathered numerous political crises since its signing a quarter of a century ago. Yet King Abdullah has said the peace is “cold and getting colder.” This is due primarily to the reverberations of Israeli-Palestinian relations inside Jordan.

• Any permanent and unilateral change by Israel to the status of Jerusalem or the West Bank could severely undermine relations further. With reason, Israel and Jordan only signed their peace deal one year after the Declaration of Principles was concluded between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organisation in September 1993.