HIGH LEVEL CONTACT

HIGH LEVEL CONTACT

Ad-Dustour 2017-10-27

By: Oraib Al Rantawi

If I am not mistaken, Hamas Politburo head Isma'il Haniyeh's phone call to King 'Abdullah II two days ago was the first contact between the two sides at this level since the end of 2012 or the beginning of 2013.

This was when Khaled Mish'al visited Amman more than once, and met with the King and senior officials at the height of the short 'honeymoon' between Jordan and the Palestinian Islamist movement.

Hamas believes that it has offered sufficient concessions to push the Palestinian reconciliation forward. It is now trying hard to reap the yield of its position and build on it so as to regain its relations with certain Arab states and to develop its already existing relations with others.

Hamas realizes that a number of Arab capitals are seeking Palestinian national reconciliation because this is the precondition that paves the way for Trump's initiative to resolve the Palestinian/Israeli conflict. Consequently, it wants to derive the benefits of what it has done and to pluck more of the fruits whose price it has already paid to President Sissi and President Abu Mazin in advance.

Haniyeh's call falls within this context. It is part of a PR campaign that 'Abu al-'Abed' [Haniyeh] has been conducting personally over the past weeks since the Cairo dialogues when the wheel of Palestinian dialogue and reconciliation began to turn. The man is likely to pursue this mission with other capitals and additional Arab leaders.

Hamas also believes that it is necessary to contain the effects of the visit paid by a large and senior Hamas delegation to Iran led by Hamas Politburo deputy head Saleh al-'Arouri and that gave rise to much concern, doubt, and criticism. Some viewed this as allowing for an 'Iranian' intervention in the Palestinian reconciliation aimed at sabotaging it, but also as an attempt by Hamas to play all its available cards and to dance to all the tunes at the same time. By contacting the capitals of 'Arab moderation', Haniyeh is seeking to dispel any potentially negative effects the Tehran visit may have on the movement's situation, its gains, and the new view of it in these capitals.

From Jordan's point of view, the royal acceptance of the phone conversation expresses Amman's support for the Palestinian reconciliation and Egypt's mediation. Jordan had already welcomed the reconciliation and declared that it values the Egyptian mediator's role.

In fact, this Jordanian position is consistent with the position of the 'moderate' Arab capitals that have rushed to mediate the reconciliation, back it, and bless it, or not hinder it at the very least. We saw various capitals simply swallowing their reservations about Hamas despite its Brotherhood affiliations.

And we have seen a postponement of the attempt to impose [Fatah dissident] Colonel Mohammad Dahlan on the Palestinian leadership, thereby also postponing the attempt to bring him back to the Palestinian arena via the Gaza window, after having been ousted from it via the West Bank's door.

All parties are preoccupied with the deal that Trump is preparing for. All capitals are interested in paving his way and in facilitating his task. But this undoubtedly requires some form of reconciliation by extending the Ramallah PA's writ from the West Bank to the Gaza Strip. This explains the significance or secret behind Egypt's enthusiasm for reconciliation. And this is how we can best explain the Arab welcome for the Palestinian reconciliation and Egypt's mediation.

But I do not believe that the King's readiness to take Haniyeh's phone call entails any change in the Jordanian position towards Hamas. It will not lay the foundations for a new leaf in relations between the two sides that deteriorated after 1999 with subsequent decisions to close Hamas' offices and banish its leaders from Jordan. The situation remained bad until 2012 when Jordan began to believe that the Muslim Brotherhood would rule many countries as well as wide areas of the Arab world. As a result, the door was opened to Abu al-Walid [former Hamas Politburo head Khalid Mish'al] who offered his good offices in mediating with Mohammad Mursi's [Egyptian] regime and the Tunisian government, and volunteered in fact to try and convince Jordan's Brotherhood to take part in the 2013 elections. And the rest of the story is well-known.

Jordan is most likely to deal with Hamas within the official and legal framework of the Palestinian government, the PA, and the PLO and nothing more. As for the bilateral level, many local and regional media have been exaggerating in promoting the notion of a 'breakthrough' in Amman's relations with Hamas, going so far as to predict reopening the movement's offices in the Jordanian capital. I believe that such a scenario is unlikely (not to say impossible) in the foreseeable and visible future.

From Jordan's perspective, the phone conversation is more of an expression of Amman's support for the reconciliation, rather than any expression of a desire to revive relations with Hamas. More importantly, it is an expression of Jordan's conviction of the need to overcome the obstacles facing Trump's task. For Jordan's views the U.S. president's initiative as the last chance to salvage the two-state solution.

I believe that Jordan's policy in this regard is consistent and in harmony with the efforts of the 'Arab quartet', which includes Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE alongside Jordan.