The Gulf War and the Peace Process : Introduction To The Region

The Eastern Mediterranean was plunged into crisis with the August 2, 1990 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. Early on, Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, with the support of Jordan and the PLO, suggested “linkage” as a way of solving the Gulf crisis; that is, he would withdraw from Kuwait when Israel withdrew from the West Bank, Gaza, and Golan, and Syria from Lebanon. This gesture and promises to liberate Palestine won Saddam the support of desperate Palestinians. Tensions were further inflamed in October 1990 when Israeli police killed 17 Palestinians and wounded almost 150 in a riot on the Temple Mount-the worst single day of violence in Israel since the 1967 war. Egypt challenged Saddam’s bid for leadership of the Arab world, with Mubarak joining the U.S.-led coalition along with Saudi Arabia, the Gulf states, and Syria. On January 18, 1991, immediately after the outbreak of war in the Gulf, the first of 39 Iraqi Scud missiles fell on Tel Aviv and Haifa. Israel, under pressure from the U.S. and fearful of an Arab-Israeli conflagration and of chaos in Jordan, did not retaliate, allowing the coalition to take on Iraq.

The war left King Hussein shaken, as Jordan struggled to absorb approximately 300,000 Palestinians and Jordanians no longer welcome in the Gulf countries. Across the river, Israel’s demographics were also in flux, as the country took in 450,000 Jews fleeing the former Soviet Union and Ethiopia.