Death of a Salesman
Editorial

Everyone is falling over one another trying to say kind things about the
late King Hussein of Jordan. He was wise, he was patient, he was a
peacemaker, he was honest, etc., etc.
My memory is too long for that.
When King Hussein blew up 56 synagogues in Jerusalem's Old City while
Jordan ruled the place from 1948 to 1967, he became just another
terroristic Arab dictator in my mind. No Jew was allowed in the Old
City, period. Thus, the original home of ancient Judaism, it's temple
site, was the only place in the world where Jews were not allowed to
even walk down the streets. Gentiles who wanted to visit Jerusalem, like
our tourists, were obliged to come in from the east, from Jordan, on the
pretense that there was no Israel and the entire country was Arab owned.
It would be a terrible crime if any individual blew up one synagogue,
one church, or one mosque anywhere in this world. Fifty-six houses of
worship destroyed may be a record for all history.
King Hussein also seized tombstones out of a Jewish cemetery on the
Mount of Olives to pave roads. Jewish peoples have, for centuries,
been buried there because they recognized that, "... His feet shall
stand in that day upon the mount of Olives, which is before Jerusalem on
the east..." (Zech. 14:4). (They did not necessarily expect Jesus
Christ as the Messiah, but in any case, they believed in the
resurrection and they wanted to be right up front when it happened!)
He also had a four-lane highway built from Amman to Jerusalem so that
he could enjoy zooming around in his sports car, a hobby pursued
also by the new king on his Harley Davidson motorcycle. The new king,
Abdullah, also shares his father's preference for beautiful Western
wives and is married to a knockout, who also enjoys the Harley Davidson.
King Hussein had three Western wives, including the American Queen Noor.
King Hussein's lasting legacy was his invention of the curious term
"West Bank" for the half of arable Israel that the Palestinians
claim to be their own. What salesmanship! Persuading the world that
only a riverbank was in question, Hussein proceeded to occupy a huge
portion of Israel. It's as if someone would refer to the Atlantic Coast
but mean that it ends at the Mississippi River and takes in all land in
between.
It was a brilliant idea, as far as propaganda goes. Perhaps only the
invention of the term "Palestinian" for the sundry Arabs who migrated to
Israel during the Jewish rebuilding did greater favors for the
pretenders on the land.
The Hussein family — ordinary people, not particularly descended
from royalty — have lived lives of such ease and ridiculous
spending that they beggar the Arabian Knights of legend. I once examined
the 500-person yacht, a 20,000 ton vessel, which belonged not to King
Hussein but merely to his brother, the crown prince. This was during a
reign when the average Jordanian lived in total poverty and unemployment
was rampant. Lavish palaces at Acaba, Jerusalem, and elsewhere allowed
the king to live a life enviable by monarchs anywhere.
About all I can give King Hussein credit for is standing up to the
PLO, first in 1980 with "Black September," when he ushered a whole
gang of Palestinians out of Jordan and into Beirut. The PLO has fomented
war wherever it resided, whether Jordan, Lebanon, or Israel. King
Hussein vied with Arafat about the Temple Mount and insisted on control
of that site, considered holy to Moslems. Presently, during this "peace
process," he has conducted friendlier relations with Israel than his
grandfather, who was assassinated for trying to make peace with Israel
in the early '50s. A total dictator, he owned all the land, and all the
people, until his dying day and he even picked the new king when he
could barely raise his hand to point.
In connection with King Hussein's funeral, Bill Clinton visited
with the Syrian dictator, Hafez el Assad. Assad won a new seven year
term in a recent "election" by 99.98 percent of the vote. The other .02
percent could be held in the same cemetery. Those two really deserve
each other — a black-hearted dictator oppressing one of the most
backward police states in the world — and the President who will
bow before anybody if it will get him the slightest approval in the
polls.
Three U.S. presidents may have attended his funeral, but I'll go with
A.M. Rosenthal of the New York Times, who described Hussein
as, "The King of Jordan; never for sale, but always for lease."

Return to Index
Return to Levitt Letter Archive Index
Return to Home Page