Life And Times : Government & Politics

After about ten minutes in Jordan, you’ll notice pictures of a litde bald man with a smooth smile everywhere you look. Refrain from jokes; he’s the king, and you are in his kingdom; Jordan is very much the fiefdom of Hussein bin Talal. The kingdom was a 1921 gift from Britain to the Hashemite royal family (for details see the Introduction to the Region), who proudly trace their lineage direcdy to the Prophet.

King Hussein has ruled since 1953- He divorced his first two queens, Dina and n Muna al-Hussein (a Briton who changed her name from Antoinette Gardiner); his third, Alia (a Palestinian), died in a plane crash. “It was the Amman Go-Kart Club that ^ really brought us together more informally,” the king sighed about Muna, The cur- ” rent queen, Noor (nee Lisa Halaby), is an Arab-American and a graduate of Prince- C ton. Hussein’s brother Crown Prince Hassan serves as advisor and heir to the -throne. Educated in Britain, King Hussein is generally moderate and pro-Western, but, as Palestinians will teil you, remembering their 20,000 dead from the 1970 civil war, he can be brutal if his throne is at stake. Above all, he is a slipper}’ and brilliant politician; these skills have kept him alive through assassination attempts and several wars. (Luck has also been a factor; the same bullets that killed his grandfather, King Abdallah, bounced off a medal on the young Hussein’s chest.) After Kim II Sung of North Korea, Hussein is the longest-ruling head of state in the world.