Israeli leaders expressed uncertainty Monday about the true intentions of Jordan’s King Hussein toward Palestinians in the West Bank.
Hussein appeared on television Sunday night to announce, in a landmark speech, that he was cutting legal and administrative ties with the West Bank in order to clear the way for an independent Palestinian state under the Palestine Liberation Organization.
Last week, Jordan dropped its five-year economic assistance plan to the West Bank and dissolved the lower house of Parliament, half of whose members are from the territory.
Rumors were spreading here Monday that Hussein is determined to go ahead and adopt further, more drastic measures against the residents of the West Bank.
According to those rumors, the Jordanian government would no longer issue passports to the residents of the territories, would end economic aid to a number of public institutions and would abolish some $70 million in salaries paid annually to 20,000 civil servants in the West Bank.
But despite the rumors, there was no clear indication whether Hussein intended to take further measures to implement his decision to cut ties to the West Bank.
Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir told Israel Television on Monday that Hussein has been disengaged from the West Bank for quite some time. Therefore, his move would not affect political developments in the region, Shamir suggested.
Shamir said the Jordanian move confirms his belief that Hussein has no influence on the local population of the West Bank.
OPTIONS FOR PEACE
The premier also pointed to what he termed “internal conflict” in Hussein’s speech: The king supported the right of self-determination of the Palestinians in the West Bank, while denying the same right to Palestinians living in Jordan.
Shamir implied that on either side of the Jordan River, the Palestinians make a weak case for statehood. He reiterated his view that the only reasonable way to peace is within the framework of the Camp David accords.
But during the same program, Foreign Minister Shimon Peres said that the message that came across form Hussein is that until elections are held in Israel on Nov. 1, “there are no options whatsoever for negotiations.”
Asked whether the king’s latest move amounts to the end of the “Jordanian option,” Peres replied: “If there is no Israeli option, what can the king do?”
He apparently was referring to the national unity coalition’s failure to reach a consensus on the peace process. Peres, who heads the Labor Party, has favored an international peace conference as a prelude to direct negotiations. Shamir and his Likud bloc are adamantly opposed to this concept.
The foreign minister expressed satisfaction that Hussein did, in fact, stress in his speech his commitment to the peace process.
“Now we all understand that one must wait until the decision is made in Israel,” he said. “The elections will determine whether the Jordanian option has died or not.”
Peres interpreted the Jordanian move as putting a challenge before the local population to “translate” the uprising into a political solution. But, he noted, the PLO has no political solutions.
“And at the end of the road, anyone who wants to put an end to the ‘intifada,’ must talk to both the Jordanians and the Palestinians,” he said.
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