Genius for Survival

Amid the sudden discussion of a Jordanian-Palestinian federation, Palestine Liberation Organization Leader Yasser Arafat is expected to fly this week to Amman for talks with King Hussein. For Arafat, such a trip will be not quite a journey to Canossa, but very close to it. An organizer of the Al Fatah guerrilla movement, who once directed fedayeen operations against Israel from Jordanian caves, he has not seen Amman since the Black September of 1970, when Hussein's army took bloody action because the Palestinians had become so independent in their assaults on Israeli territory that they were defying the King's sovereignty. The army kicked the fedayeen completely out of Jordan; Arafat since then has missed few opportunities to malign the King. A Jordanian visit at this point would be a significant gesture for both men.

Personally disparate--Arafat is spartan and hyperbolic, Hussein congenial and blunt--the two men otherwise have more in common than either cares to admit. Hussein rules a rather shaky dynasty that was created by Western powers after World War I; Arafat is the strongest chieftain in a fragmented Palestinian movement that is principally held together by hatred of Israel--and distrust of other Arab rulers. Both have a genius for survival, a talent for accommodation.

For expelling the guerrillas from Jordan, the plucky little King (or P.L.K., as he is fondly known in some quarters) became an Arab pariah. Hussein was ignored at conferences, slighted when oil subsidies were handed out, finally humiliated at the Rabat summit of 1974, where he was stripped of the right to represent West Bank Palestinians (who still hold Jordanian citizenship) in future peace negotiations with Israel. Instead the Palestinians were given the right to negotiate over the status of Palestinian territory on the West Bank and in Gaza. Arafat meanwhile was lionized. He took his "guns and olive branch" liberation theory to the podium of the United Nations General Assembly after Rabat. He was also granted head-of-government status in the Arab League, although he did not even head a government in exile.

The pendulum swung back last year in Lebanon. Arafat and the Palestinians misjudged their strength and thereupon entered a losing military and political battle with Syria. They now find themselves dependent on moderate governments in Egypt, Syria and Saudi Arabia. Meanwhile the irrepressible Hussein, who handled his humiliation at Rabat with particular grace, has re-emerged as a force in Arab peace negotiations. Today Hussein sits more securely on his throne, so much so that he has felt strong enough to advocate a Jordanian-Palestinian federation. Arafat is less secure but still a likely choice to head whatever Palestinian state emerges.

Such a union between a Palestinian state and Jordan still faces bitter debate next month in Cairo, when the Palestine National Council will discuss the issue and Arafat's acceptance of it. Even if the idea of confederation survives to become eventual reality, pairing ministates run by Hussein and Arafat would be like mixing oil and water. Committee rule would result in chaos and sooner or later a showdown. The P.L.K. won the last such showdown in 1970; if it actually came to another, he would very likely win again.

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