Strategic crossroads: Jordan, Israel, and the shifting regional order

Ammon

6 days ago

The joint press conference held recently in Amman—featuring Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi, U.S. Special Envoy for Syria Thomas Barak, and Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shibani—delivered a powerful message about the region's shifting dynamics. It underscored Jordan's deep concern over the tragic events unfolding in Suwayda and, more broadly, in Syria. For Amman, these developments are not merely neighboring conflicts—they are directly linked to Jordan's national security and its evolving regional role.
The ongoing unrest in Suwayda, despite a declared ceasefire, remains volatile and laden with strategic implications from a Jordanian perspective. Chief among these is the dangerous shift in Israel's security doctrine—from a defensive posture to one of assertive regional dominance. Israel now aspires to be the region's foremost power, even positioning itself as the sole security enforcer in the Middle East.
Israel's agenda in Syria appears to oscillate between two alarming objectives: fragmenting the country into a collection of weak, rival statelets; and establishing a demilitarized, fragile zone in southern Syria—open to regular Israeli military intervention. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has openly declared his ambition for such a demilitarized zone. More concerning, however, is Israel's attempt to legitimize its military involvement by invoking the protection of the Druze community and engaging with Druze religious leaders such as Sheikh Hikmat al-Hijri in Suwayda. Through these moves, Israel is positioning itself as a stakeholder in Syria's internal affairs, laying claim to the right to shape its future—a development with potentially far-reaching consequences for the entire region.
From Amman's standpoint, what's unfolding in Suwayda resonates deeply with national security priorities. In a recent closed-door roundtable hosted by the Politics and Society Institute, Jordanian military, intelligence, and policy experts emphasized that the crisis in Suwayda cannot be viewed in isolation from what's happening in Gaza—or even the West Bank. Participants warned that Israel's evolving strategy could soon manifest in dangerous new policies across the region, including in the occupied Palestinian territories.
But how does Suwayda connect to the West Bank? To answer this, we must first identify the threats Israel's actions in Syria pose to Jordan. Jordan's primary strategic interest in Syria is preserving the territorial unity of the Syrian state. That depends on the strength of the new political system and its capacity to integrate Syria's diverse communities into a cohesive national framework. Any descent into civil war or political fragmentation would not only destabilize Syria, but also trigger cascading threats across the region—chief among them, to Jordan. These include fresh waves of refugees, a potential ISIS resurgence, border insecurity, disruptions to shared water resources, delays in refugee repatriation, and a spike in cross-border drug smuggling and terrorism.
From this vantage point, Israel's strategic direction in Syria constitutes a top-tier threat to Jordan. This threat is compounded by fears in Amman that the Israeli far-right government may seek to establish a pro-Israel Druze enclave in southern Syria—reminiscent of the South Lebanon Army during the Lebanese civil war. Such a development would trigger two deeply concerning consequences: renewed displacement of Syrian populations from Daraa due to worsening conditions, and an Israeli encirclement of Jordan from the north and west—effectively transforming Tel Aviv into a regional juggernaut.
This leads us back to the West Bank. Under Israel's current strategic vision, the two-state solution has been effectively abandoned. At the same time, the Trump administration has shown no real interest in reviving peace efforts. On the contrary, Israel appears to be implementing a premeditated plan involving land annexation, the dismantling of the Palestinian Authority, and the transformation of the West Bank into isolated, controllable cantons.
What is unfolding in Syria—especially in the aftermath of the October 7 attack and Israel's war on Gaza—and what is brewing in the West Bank, are both manifestations of a dangerous new Israeli strategic doctrine. These developments suggest that no regional actor currently possesses either the political will or the leverage to halt Israeli efforts to forcibly reshape the demographic and geopolitical landscape in line with Netanyahu's long-term vision. If Israel can redraw the map in Syria, it is all the more capable of implementing even more consequential policies in the West Bank and Jerusalem, particularly regarding the Palestinian demographic question—posing a direct challenge to Jordan's core interests.
Jordan's problem with Israel, then, is no longer limited to the occupation of the West Bank. It is now inseparably linked to Israel's broader regional ambitions—in Syria, the West Bank, Jerusalem, and Gaza. This means that diplomatic tensions and strategic anxieties between Amman and Tel Aviv are steadily intensifying, despite the existing peace treaty. Even more alarming is that Israel no longer seeks to present itself as a vulnerable, security-conscious state. Instead, it is acting as a dominant regional power bent on imposing its agenda and capitalizing on the overwhelming imbalance of power in its favor.