Black September: The 1970–71 Events and their Impact on the Formation of Jordanian National Identity

Abstract

Soon after the 1967 War, the Palestinian Resistance Movements (PRM) which established themselves in Jordan challenged Jordan's authority presenting a military and even existential threat to Hashemite rule. The prestige of the fedayeen as the primary torchbearers of the struggle against Israel rose dramatically following the Karameh Operation of March 1968, which was perceived as a military victory by the PRM and entrenched its legitimacy. The period between the Karameh raid and September 1970 was characterized by the strengthening of the fedayeen organizations and their entrenchment in Jordan by means of the establishment of autonomous military, political, and social institutions. The bloody events of September 1970–July 1971 induced a change in Jordan's official ideological line and marked a significant step in the coalescence of Jordanian national identity. From then on, the particularist trans-Jordanian identity in Jordan was emphasized more explicitly, along with such other attributes of this identity as Bedouin tribal identity, Islamic identity, and Hashemite identity.

Notes

 1. The Palestinian version which appears, for instance, in the books of Abas Murad and Abu Iyad emphasizes the negative attitude of the Hashemite regime in Jordan to the PRM. In contrast, the Jordanian version, found for instance in the books of Ali Al-Edroos and Suleiman Musa, presents the struggle between Jordan and the PRM as a struggle over the ruling of Jordan. See Abbas Murad, Al-Dawr Al-Sitasi Liljaysh Al-Urduni 1921–1973 (Beirut: Munazamat al-Tahrir Al-Filastiniyya 1973); Abu Iyad, Lelo Moledet (Tel Aviv: Mifras 1972) pp.116–7 (in Hebrew); Ali Al-Edroos, The Hashemite Arab Army 1908–1979 (Amman: The Publishing Committee 1980) pp.438–49; Suleiman Musa, Taarikh Al-Urdun fi Al-Karn Al-Ishrin 1958–1995 (Amman: Al-Juz Al-Thani 1995) pp.27–8.

 2. Christopher Dobson assumes that the period from 1968 to 1969 was the Golden Era of the Palestinian resistance movement. See Christopher Dobson, Black September (London: Robert Hale & Company 1975) p.33.

 3. John Cooley, Green March, Black September (London: Frank Cass 1973) pp.98–104.

 4. Zeev Schiff and Raphael Rothstien (eds), Fedayeen: The Story of the Palestinian Guerrillas (London: Valentine and Mitchell 1974) p.78.

 5. Joseph Nevo, ‘Is There a Jordanian Entity?’, Jerusalem Quarterly (Summer 1980) p.103.

 6. Al-Edroos (note 1) p.439.

 7. Andrew Terril, ‘The Political Mythology of the Battle of Karameh’, Middle East Journal 55 (Winter 2001) p.92.

 8. Adnan Abu Odeh, Jordanians, Palestinians and the Hashemite Kingdom in the Middle East Peace Process (Washington DC: United States Institute of Peace Press 1999) p.171.

 9. See Al-Edroos (note 1) p.450; Musa (note 1) pp.258–9. John Cooley notes that ‘Israel admitted losing twenty-one killed in the battle. The fedayeen claimed that the true figure was over 200’ – see Cooley (note 3) p.101.

10. Baker Khazer Al-Majali, Al-Malaf Al-Wathaiki Limaarik Al-Karameh (Amman, 1993) p.108; see also: Yezid Sayigh, Armed Struggle and the Search for State: The Palestinian National Movement (Oxford, UK: Clarendon Press 1997) p.179; Abu Iyad with Eric Rouleau, My Home My Land: A Narrative of the Palestinian Struggle (New York: Times Books 1981) pp.57–60.

11. See also Sayigh (note 10) p.179; Al-Edroos (note 1) pp.438–43.

12. King Hussein of Jordan (as told to and with additional material by Vick Vance and Pier Lauer), My War with Israel (New York: William Morrow and Company, Inc. 1969) p.141.

13. Al-Edroos (note 1) p.439.

14. Terril (note 7) pp.98–103.

15. Terril (note 7) p.105.

16. Terril (note 7) pp.103–5.

17. Terril (note 7) pp.97–8.

18. See Joseph Massad, Colonial Effects – The Making of National Identity in Jordan (New York: Columbia University Press 2001) p.242.

19. Musa (note 1) pp.258–9.

20. March 21 is to this day a Jordanian national event, celebrated yearly in Jordan in a military ceremony at the monument south of the town of Karameh.

21. Jordanian school textbooks also relate to the battle of Karameh as a Jordanian victory. See Abbas Al-Kurd, Taarikh Al-Arab wa Al-Muslimin (Amman, 1970).

22. Karameh in Arabic means dignity, this battle became a pivotal event in the emergence of a new Palestinian political identity; see Cooley (note 3) p.102.

23. Paul Lalor, Black September 1970: The Palestinian Resistance Movement in Jordan, 1967–1971, PhD dissertation (University of Cambridge 1992) p.87.

24. Ehud Yaari, Fatah (Tel Aviv: Levin Epshtien 1970) pp.169–70.

25. These organizations set up hospitals and clinics to their people, they built schools to children of the PRM members who were killed or arrested in Israel, and granted scholarships to Palestinian students who studied abroad.

26. The London Times reported towards the end of 1968 that the fedayeen ‘is almost a parallel government to the (legitimate) government in several parts of the country.’

27. Arafat made a political pact with the old opposition circles, organized under the roof of the ‘National Union,’ under the heading of Suleiman Al-Nabulsi who was involved in the attempt of coup against Hussein in 1957.

28. These activities were performed through broadcastings in the radio stations of Fatah and through meetings of public relation officers of the organization with heads of tribes, and mostly with the Bani Sakher in the South.

29. Al-Difa' 20 December 1968.

30. The Muhajirun are in Islamic History the early Muslims who followed Muhammad in his migration (Hijra) from Mecca to Medina; the Ansar are the Medinan citizens that helped Muhammad and the Muhajirun on their arrival to the city. See also Laurie Brand, ‘Al-Muhajirin W-Al-Ansar: Hashemite Strategies for Managing Communal Identity in Jordan’, in Leonard Binder (ed.) Ethnic Conflict and International Politics in the Middle East (Gainesville: University Press of Florida 1999) p.279.

31. The Observer 15 December 1968.

32. Moshe Shemesh, The Palestinian Entity 1959–1974 (London: Frank Cass 1996) p.132.

33. See Olivier Carre, Septembre Noire: Refus Arabe de La Resistance Palestinienne (Brussels, 1980) p.60.

34. Lalor (note 23) p.182.

35. Lalor (note 23) p.222.

36. Musa (note 1) p.319.

37. King Hussein's choice of a Palestinian for the role of the prime minister of the new government was not accidental. Rather, it served as disguise of the king's future plan to act against Palestinian Organizations.

38. Abu Odeh (note 8) pp.183–4.

39. Asher Susser, On Both Banks of the Jordan: A Political Biography of Wasfi al-Tall (Newberry Park, UK: Frank Cass 1994) p.138.

40. Nigel Ashton claims that King Hussein in fact saw Israel as a threat during the crisis; see Nigel Ashton, ‘Pulling the Strings: King Hussein's Role during the Crisis of 1970 in Jordan’, The International History Review 28 (March 2006) p.105.

41. The rate of Palestinians in the Jordanian army during the battles is unclear. Some claim that the Palestinians composed 60 percent of the Jordanian army. King Hussein himself asserted that the majority of his army consisted of Palestinians. Yazid Sayigh, on the other hand, estimates the rate of Palestinians as 45 percent (at the time when two-thirds of the population in the state were Palestinians).

42. Al-Wathaiq Al-Urduniyya 1970 (Amman, 1971) pp.185–91.

43. Abu-Odeh (note 8) p.184.

44. Cooley (note 3) p.119.

45. Abu Odeh claims that ‘His appointment was a renewed signal that the fighting was not between Palestinians and Jordanians but between the state and the fedayeen.’ See Abu Odeh (note 8) p.185.

46. Abu Odeh claims that ‘His appointment was a renewed signal that the fighting was not between Palestinians and Jordanians but between the state and the fedayeen.’ See Abu Odeh (note 8) p.183.

47. Paul Lalor, ‘Black September, White September’, paper presented at a symposium sponsored by the Centre d'Etudes et de Recherches sur le Moyen-Orient Contemporain, Paris, 24–25 June 1995.

48. Yezid Sayigh, ‘Jordan in the 1980s: Legitimacy, Entity and Identity’, in Rodney Wilson (ed.) Politics and the Economy in Jordan (New York: Routledge 1990) pp.173, 177.

49. Marc Lynch, State Interests and Public Spheres: The International Politics of Jordan's Identity (New York: Columbia University Press 1999) p.79.

50. Raphael Israeli, Palestinians between Israel and Jordan (New York: Praeger 1991) p.76.

51. Schirin Fathi, Jordan – An Invented Nation? Tribe-State Dynamics and the Formation of National Identity (Hamburg, 1994) p.258.

52. Schirin Fathi, Jordan – An Invented Nation? Tribe-State Dynamics and the Formation of National Identity (Hamburg, 1994) p.212.

53. Michael Hudson, Arab Politics – The Search for Legitimacy (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press 1977) p.210.

54. Haaretz 8 April 1971.

55. Al-Anbaa' (East Jerusalem) 20 April 1971. Three years after the events ended, the east-Jerusalem newspaper Al Fajr published a tough article whose title spoke for itself: ‘We Will Never Forgive It.’

56. Muhamad Abu Shlalabiyya, la Salam Bighair dawla filastiniyya hura (al-Kuds, 1971) pp.24–4, 79–80.

57. See Shemesh (note 32) pp.298–9.

58. Abu Odeh (note 8) pp.189–90.

59. Middle East Record 1969–1970 p.881.

60. Al-Wathaik Al-Urduniyya 1971 pp.5–6.

61. Joseph Nevo, King Hussein and the Evolution of Jordan's Perception of a Political Settlement with Israel, 1967–1988 (Brighton, UK: Sussex Academic Press 2006) p.41.

62. Susser (note 39) p.157.

63. Susser (note 39) p.159.

64. Joseph Nevo, The Wasfi Al-Tal's Era in Jordan 1970–71: Attempts to Establish a Jordanian Entity (Haifa, 1979) pp.2–4.

65. Susser (note 39) p.162; Abu-Odeh (note 14) p.200.

66. Yasser Arafat called the September 1970 events ‘Act of genocide’; see Cyrus Sulzberger, An Age of Mediocrity (New York: Macmillan 1973) p.680.

67. Josef Massad, A Jordanian of Palestinian origin presents the following accusation in his book: ‘The unofficial academic arm of the pro-Israel lobby in the United States [such figures as Jeffrey Goldberg and Robert Satloff] began propagating a fabrication that “East Bankers” refer to Black September as “White September”.’ See Massad (note 18) pp.339–40.

68. Cooley (note 3).

69. James Lunt asserts that the true figure will probably never be established but it would seem that between 1,500 and 2,000 dead is the most likely figure. See James Lunt, Hussein of Jordan (New York: Morrow 1989) p.42.

70. Hussein Sirriyeh, ‘Jordan and the Legacies of the Civil War of 1970–71’, Civil Wars 3/3 (Autumn 2000) p.77.

71. Yaari (note 24) p.164.

72. Shemesh (note 32) p.148.

73. Raad Al-Kadiri, ‘The Palestinian Factor in Jordanian Foreign Policy 1967–1988’, in Kirsten Schulze, Martin Stokes, and Colm Campbell (eds) Nationalism, Minorities and Diasporas: Identities and Rights in the Middle East (London: Tauris 1996) p.72.