According to Localcollegeexplorer, in the short Palestinian campaign of 1948, Jordan (still Transjordan at the time) had demonstrated with its “Arab Legion” the only efficient military force among the young Arab states, going beyond the Jordan to Jerusalem. But stronger than pan-Arab solidarity was King Abdallah’s desire to expand and enrich his own state, so against the opinion of the other allies he did not hesitate to incorporate (December 10, 1948) the conquered territories into the Jordanian territory, giving the resulting complex the name “Hashimite Kingdom of the Jordan” (April 26, 1949). In the situation created by the armistice of Rhodes, the greatest problem for Jordan was that of relations with neighboring Israel. If he could have disregarded the obligations of solidarity with fraternal states, modus vivendi with Israel, and polls to that effect were repeatedly denounced with scandal by Arab nationalism; but in reality this did not happen, and Jordan assumed the role of suspicious and hostile sentinel of Arabism towards the intruder who had not been able to drive out by force. To the mass of Palestinian refugees taking refuge on its territory, it granted the right of citizenship, without prejudice to that reintegration into the homeland, which remains an ever-lively theoretical need of the Arabs towards Israel. But it was precisely the introduction of this restless external element into his social structure (which had hitherto been largely Bedouin, and faithful to the Hashimite dynasty) brought with it the germ of new disturbances and conflicts in the young state. The mass of Palestinian origin burned with the desire for restorative revenge, and of the extirpation of Israel, and he considered King Abdallah’s political possibilism, and his never denied link with England, as a betrayal of the Arab cause. From these rancor arose the attack in Jerusalem on June 20, 1951, apparently organized on the mandate of the Mufti of Palestine, of which King Abdallah fell victim.

After a brief interlude by his son Ṭalāl, of Anglophobic sentiments but suffering from a serious nervous imbalance, the crown passed by decision of the Parliament (12 August 1952) to the son of this Ḥusein, then a minor, assisted by a Council of regency. And since then Jordan has entered the most recent and dramatic period of its history, exposed to very serious internal and external shocks, which threatened the once peaceful Hashimite dominion of the desert at its base. The young king Ḥusein had in fact to take into account on the one hand the anti-English rancor winding in one part of the country (and to give them satisfaction he was induced in March 1956 to fire the creator and commander of the Arab Legion, Glubb Pascià, with other British officers.); has also maintained, nor could it otherwise, the principled intransigence in the problem of Israel; but on the other hand he soon saw himself threatened by the thrust of pan-Arab nationalism, which saw in the star source of Giamāl ‛Abd an-Nāṣir its leader, and in his unscrupulous international politics the stages of Arab unity. All ‘ Anschluss Egyptian of Syria, an attempt was made on the Hashimite side, under the inspiration of Nūrī Āl Sa‛īd, with the federation between Jordan and ‛Irāq (” Arab Union “, of February 14, 1958), which should have constituted a counterblock to Nasserian expansionism; but this measure had just begun to take effect, when the lightning Iraqi coup d’etat of the following 14 July destroyed its premises, and by eliminating the Hashimite branch of ‛Irāq directly threatened that of Jordan as well. The days of King Husein, in the summer of 1958, seemed numbered, when the RAU and the Irāq, whose intimate rivalry had not yet come to light, pressed from opposite sides on the Jordan, which itself was traversed by thrills and retching. of rebellion. But Husein bravely faced the storm: he did not hesitate to accept or urge the British military aid, with the dispatch of paratroopers who proped up the vacillating throne of ‛Irāq‛ Ammān at the most critical moment. And when these were withdrawn after a few months, he was able to take advantage of the emerging Egyptian-Iraqi dualism, to consolidate his precarious position with purges in the army and other measures. In the winter of 1960-61, the reign of Jordan, whose survival in 1958 seemed a desperate cause, was still a reality today.