America gets its money’s worth for its aid to Middle East ally Jordan

The aftermath of Hamas’s Oct. 7 massacre has served as a crucible for nations in the Middle East. The nascent regional realignment, which began with the Abraham Accords of 2020, is now being tested. Nations are choosing whether or how they will help bolster regional peace and security.

Happily for Americans, Jordan is passing the test as a U.S. ally taking meaningful action for regional security, justifying the heaps of foreign assistance the U.S. pledges to the Hashemite Kingdom every year.

Jordan has received more than $31 billion in U.S. aid since relations were established in 1949. The bulk of that has come in the decades since Jordan made a cold peace with its neighbor Israel in 1994.

In 2022 the U.S. State Department agreed to a new deal to supply Jordan with $1.45 billion per year in aid through 2029. The U.S. military has also spent hundreds of millions of Defense Department dollars to help Jordan bolster its military forces and secure its borders with Iraq and Syria.

In exchange, Jordan has long served American interests well in the region. It hosts U.S. troops on its soil, provides intelligence and diplomatic support for myriad initiatives, houses hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees and remains a constructive actor for Middle East peace.

For most foreign policy practitioners, these cooperative activities would be enough to justify billions in American aid. But spending on foreign assistance is a much harder sell to the American public these days. More Americans are questioning the value of U.S. global engagement, and especially the financial costs of supporting allies.

These questions have some common-sense roots. After all, why provide aid to nations whose actions don’t completely align with American interests? Why subsidize nations that fail to adequately spend to defend their own people? What’s the point of all this spending?

Fortunately, the country of Jordan’s actions in helping defend Israel on April 13 justified the large sums of bilateral assistance funded by American tax dollars. All indications show that Jordan, along with Saudi Arabia, provided invaluable assistance as the Iranian attack got underway. Reuters reported that Jordanian planes shot down dozens of Iranian drones.

According to other reports, Jordan allowed the Israel Defense Forces to intercept drones and missiles over the kingdom. These steps reflect the kind of burden-sharing that Americans rightfully demand from their allies, especially those in the Middle East.

In militarily supporting the defensive response from Israel and its allies and partners, the Jordanian government has taken on an enormous risk. Jordan is home to millions of people who either claim Palestinian refugee status or are descendants of Palestinians. The presence of this substantial population inside the country’s borders poses a political threat to Jordan’s monarchical government.

Three decades of Jordanian rapprochement with Israel has not tamped down most Palestinians’ hatred of Israel or disdain for the Jordanian government’s acceptance of it. This simmering anger means that Amman lives in perpetual fear of a coup.

The attacks of Oct. 7 have intensified the potential for the downfall of the Jordanian government. Large and virulent anti-Israel, pro-Jihad protests have broken out in the streets of Amman in recent weeks, with many demonstrators also calling for an end to the Hashemite dynasty led by King Abdullah II.

Iran, Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood have worked hard to foment these demonstrations, exploiting indigenous anger in hopes of ejecting the regime in Amman, installing an Islamist government and using the country as a platform from which to attack Israel from yet another direction.

Iran’s interference conforms to the Iranian regime’s pattern of using proxy militias and outlaw groups to advance its goals. A new report by the Middle East Media Research Institute outlines plans by Hezbollah in Iraq to establish a 12,000-strong militia inside Jordan’s borders. Iran is infiltrating Jordan using convoys from Iraq laden with humanitarian aid bound for the Palestinians.

Drug-smuggling activities along Jordan’s border with Syria, largely conducted by groups linked to Syrian dictator and Iranian ally Bashar al-Assad, also give Iran opportunities to funnel weapons to hostile factions.

Curiously, a claim that Jordanian Princess Salma, an air force pilot, shot down multiple Israeli drones on April 13 gained traction on social media. It doesn’t appear to be true, but the rumor may have been an Iranian piece of disinformation designed to stoke Palestinian anger against the royal family.

In this context of mounting anti-government anger, the Jordanian government’s decision to join a military engagement against Iran was historically bold. As the Israel-Iran conflict continues to unfold, April 13 likely will not mark the last time the kingdom is forced to make a hard decision.

For now, Americans should be grateful that a country which receives billions in American aid is resisting Iranian imperialism, defending our ally Israel, and strengthening momentum for regional security cooperation. When it comes to Jordan, what Americans are really spending money on is courage.

David Wilezol is founder and president of Seventh Floor Strategies, a Washington, D.C. writing and strategic communications firm. He formerly served as the chief speechwriter to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.