AMMAN/ LONDON: Jordan has suspended a free trade agreement (FTA) with Turkey in a move as much about regional politics as imports and exports, according to a leading academic at the London School of Economics (LSE).
In an interview with Arab News, Fawaz Gerges, professor of international relations at the LSE, said: “What you are seeing now is Jordan’s realignment with its key Arab allies, to send a clear message to Turkey that what Turkey has been doing is unacceptable.”
Turkey, he claimed, had been “intervening” in internal Arab affairs — for instance, offering economic and “military support” for Qatar, which has been boycotted by Saudi Arabia, Egypt and the UAE for its alleged support of extremism and links with Iran.
According to Jordan’s state-controlled Petra news agency, Amman’s decision to suspend the FTA with Turkey was taken “in light of the closure of border crossings with neighboring countries and the shrinking of traditional markets for national exports.”
Additionally, Jordan faced “unequal” competition with Turkish products, which Amman alleged receive Turkish government subsidies, leading to negative effects for local producers. Petra reported that the FTA had “further tilted the trade balance in favor of the Turkish side, which had failed to ensure the flow of sufficient investments into Jordan.”
But Gerges told Arab News: “Behind the trade issue, relations with Turkey have reached a really low point.” He mentioned a number of tensions such as Turkey’s military incursions into Syria, the civilian casualties, Turkish support for Qatar and the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt — all these factors had “poisoned” Arab-Turkish relations,” he said.
Gerges claimed that Turkey had hosted hundreds of Muslim Brotherhood members, and Turkey had “overwhelmingly supported the Muslim Brotherhood against the Egyptian government of Abdel Fattah El-Sisi.
He said: “At one point Turkey was very powerful, a very influential state before the Arab Spring uprising. But Turkey has sided fully with the Islamists; this has really angered not just Arab regimes but also big chunks of the Arab populations,” he said.
“What Turkey is trying to do is to fill the vacuum of Arab fragility (post the Arab Spring), and this is unacceptable to key Arab states... in particular Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Egypt.”
Gerges also said that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan had gone out of his way to take sides, which he said was an example of how Turkey had not recognized “the limits of its influence.”
He added: “Jordan has been trying to walk a tightrope between its close relations with its Arab allies, and Turkey as a non Arab state. And this has now proven to be untenable. “The straw that broke the camel’s back is Turkey’s row with the Gulf over Qatar, which is a huge issue for the Arab states.”
Last year, a group of Turkish servicemen arrived at a base in southern Doha in accordance with an agreement signed between Qatar and Turkey in 2014.
The Turkish military held their first drills at the Tariq bin Ziyad military base in August 2017. It was reported that Ankara deployed yet more troops to Qatar’s Al-Udeid Air Base in December, but in February 2018 Turkey refuted claims that Ankara had sent additional military forces.
The suspension of the FTA comes a month after a visit by the Turkish foreign minister and top officials to Jordan, where they discussed political and economic relations.
Petra said that Jordan was in the process of evaluating all FTAs that may not have resulted in the envisioned benefits to the national economy.
Turkey and the UAE last week clashed in a separate incident when a senior UAE official tweeted that Turkey’s policy toward the Arab states was not reasonable and advised it to respect their sovereignty.
“It is no secret that Arab-Turkish relations aren’t in their best state,” UAE Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Anwar Gargash tweeted.
“In order to return to balance, Ankara has to respect Arab sovereignty and deal with its neighbors with wisdom and rationality,” he said.
The two countries were drawn into a different quarrel in December over a retweet by the Emirati foreign minister that Erdogan called an insult.
Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed, UAE minister of foreign affairs and international cooperation, shared a tweet at the time that accused Turkish troops of looting the holy city of Madinah a century ago, prompting Erdogan to lash out saying that the minister had been spoiled by oil money.
Turkey then renamed the street in Ankara where the UAE Embassy is located after the Ottoman military commander who Sheikh Abdullah had appeared to criticize.
Last year, Turkey exported goods and products worth $672 million to Jordan, mainly composed of textile and furniture; while Jordan mostly exports fertilizers to Turkey worth of $78 million. Turkey’s direct investments to the country stand at about $300 million.
Currently, Turkey has 24 FTAs with various countries, including Palestine, Egypt, the Palestinian Authority and Israel, while the FTA with Syria was suspended in 2011 due to the civil war. The FTA with Lebanon awaits the Lebanese parliament’s approval. The FTAs abolish customs duties between the contracting parties.
Ali Bakeer, an Ankara-based political analyst and researcher, believes that the Jordanian decision is purely economic and has nothing to do with any political issue; because it is suspended and not canceled.
But Esen Caglar, managing director of Policy Analytics Lab, a think tank and consultancy based in Ankara, said Jordan’s decision to suspend the FTA between the two countries was bad economic policy.
“Jordan is a small economy. It should be a small open economy if it wants to improve the welfare of its citizens and competitiveness of its producers,” Caglar told Arab News.
“The way of protecting its national economy is not by taking such measures, but by increasing competitiveness of its sectors. Jordan also needs to improve its investment environment and make it more predictable and cheaper to do business” he added.
Salameh Darawi, editor of the economic website Al Maqar, told Arab News that the trade deal was not providing the promised Turkish investment in Jordan. “The deal had two parts: One investment in IT and in mining industries, and the other free trade.”
While there is no disagreement that Turkey has not invested in Jordan, there are mixed opinions as to the benefits of the free trade deal. “While the trade balance is in favor of Turkey, it is not clear if subsidized Turkish goods have flooded the local market to the degree that it has hurt local products,” Darawi told Arab News.
Issam Murad, the head of the Amman Chamber of Commerce, however, responded in a statement by saying that “stopping free trade with Turkey will hurt the commercial and service sectors.” The statement further noted that “many investments, deals and agreements were made based on this agreement and all of these commercial entities who worked on the basis of an existence of a valid agreement will be hurt.”
Jordan halts free trade accord with Turkey amid increasing geopolitical tension
Jordan halts free trade accord with Turkey amid increasing geopolitical tension
Gaza civil defense says 19 killed in Israeli strikes
According to the civil defense agency, an air strike at dawn on the house of the Al-Ghoul family in Gaza City killed 11 people, seven of them children.
“The home, which housed several displaced people, was completely destroyed,” said civil defense spokesman Mahmud Bassal.
“It was a two-story building and several people are still under the rubble,” he added, saying Israeli drones had “also fired on ambulance staff.”
Contacted by AFP, the Israeli army did not immediately comment on the strike.
AFP images from the neighborhood of Shujaiya, in the east of Gaza City, showed residents combing through smoking rubble and bodies lined up on the ground, covered in white sheets.
“A huge explosion woke us up. Everything was shaking,” said witness Ahmed Mussa.
“I was surprised to see (the strike) was on the house of our neighbors, the Al-Ghoul family. It was home to children, women. There wasn’t anyone wanted or who posed a threat.”
Elsewhere, the civil defense agency said five security officers, tasked with accompanying aid convoys, were killed by an Israeli strike as they were driving in a car in the southern city of Khan Yunis.
Bassal accused Israel of having “deliberately targeted” them in order to “affect the humanitarian supply chain and increase the suffering” of the population.
The army has not yet responded to the accusations.
Local rescuers also said three members of the same family, including a child, were killed when their house was bombed in Khan Yunis.
The war in Gaza was sparked by Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, which resulted in the deaths of 1,208 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli official figures.
Israel’s retaliatory military campaign has killed at least 45,717 people in Gaza, the majority of them civilians, according to figures from the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry which the United Nations considers reliable.
Damascus Airport to resume international flights starting January 7
- International aid planes and foreign diplomatic delegations have already been landing in Syria
DAMASCUS: Syria said on Saturday the country’s main airport in Damascus would resume international flights starting next week after such commercial trips were halted following last month’s ouster of president Bashar Assad.
“We announce we will start receiving international flights to and from Damascus International Airport from” Tuesday, state news agency SANA said, quoting Ashhad Al-Salibi, who heads the General Authority of Civil Aviation and Air Transport.
“We reassure Arab and international airlines that we have begun the phase of rehabilitating the Aleppo and Damascus airports with our partners’ help, so that they can welcome flights from all over the world,” he said.
International aid planes and foreign diplomatic delegations have already been landing in Syria. Domestic flights have also resumed.
On Thursday, Qatar Airways announced it will resume flights to the Syrian capital after nearly 13 years, starting with three weekly flights on Tuesday.
A Qatari official told AFP last month that Doha had offered the new Syrian authorities help in resuming operations at Damascus airport.
On December 18, the first flight since Islamist-led rebels ousted Assad on December 8 took off from Damascus airport to Aleppo in the country’s north, AFP journalists saw.
Palestinian health ministry says one dead in Israel West Bank raid
- Israeli raids refugee camp, with the military saying it had opened fire at ‘terrorists’
- Israel has occupied the West Bank since conquering it in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war
RAMALLAH, Palestinian Territories: The health ministry in the occupied West Bank said one person was killed and nine injured in an Israeli raid on a refugee camp, with the Israeli military saying Saturday it had opened fire at “terrorists.”
An 18-year-old man, Muhammad Medhat Amin Amer, “was killed by bullets from the (Israeli) occupation in the Balata camp” in the territory’s north, the Palestinian health ministry said in a late-night statement, adding that nine people were injured, “four of whom are in critical condition.”
According to the Palestinian Red Crescent, the raid began on Friday night and triggered violent clashes.
The official Palestinian news agency Wafa reported that Israeli troops entered the camp from the Awarta checkpoint and “deployed snipers on the rooftops of surrounding buildings.”
In a statement on Saturday, the Israeli military said that during the “counterterrorism” operation, “terrorists placed explosives in the area in order to harm (military) soldiers, hurled explosives, molotov cocktails, and rocks and shot fireworks at the forces.”
“The forces fired toward the terrorists in order to remove the threat. Hits were identified,” the statement said.
Violence in the West Bank has intensified since war broke out in the Gaza Strip after Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.
Since then, at least 815 Palestinians have been killed in the territory by Israeli troops or settlers, according to the Palestinian health ministry in Ramallah.
In the same period, Palestinian attacks in the West Bank have killed at least 25 Israelis, according to official Israeli figures.
Israel has occupied the West Bank since conquering it in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.
Fragile Israel-Hezbollah truce holding so far, despite violations
- The deal struck on Nov. 27 to halt the war required Hezbollah to immediately lay down its arms in southern Lebanon
- It gave Israel 60 days to withdraw its forces there and hand over control to the Lebanese army and UN peacekeepers
BEIRUT: A fragile ceasefire between Israel and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah has held up for over a month, even as its terms seem unlikely to be met by the agreed-upon deadline.
The deal struck on Nov. 27 to halt the war required Hezbollah to immediately lay down its arms in southern Lebanon and gave Israel 60 days to withdraw its forces there and hand over control to the Lebanese army and UN peacekeepers.
So far, Israel has withdrawn from just two of the dozens of towns it holds in southern Lebanon. And it has continued striking what it says are bases belonging to Hezbollah, which it accuses of attempting to launch rockets and move weapons before they can be confiscated and destroyed.
Hezbollah, which was severely diminished during nearly 14 months of war, has threatened to resume fighting if Israel does not fully withdraw its forces by the 60-day deadline.
Yet despite accusations from both sides about hundreds of ceasefire violations, the truce is likely to hold, analysts say. That is good news for thousands of Israeli and Lebanese families displaced by the war still waiting to return home.
“The ceasefire agreement is rather opaque and open to interpretation,” said Firas Maksad, a senior fellow with the Middle East Institute in Washington. That flexibility, he said, may give it a better chance of holding in the face of changing circumstances, including the ouster of Syria’s longtime leader, Bashar Assad, just days after the ceasefire took effect.
With Assad gone, Hezbollah lost a vital route for smuggling weapons from Iran. While that further weakened Hezbollah’s hand, Israel had already agreed to the US-brokered ceasefire.
Hezbollah began firing rockets into Israel on Oct. 8, 2023 – the day after Hamas launched a deadly attack into Israel that ignited the ongoing war in Gaza. Since then, Israeli air and ground assaults have killed more than 4,000 people in Lebanon, including hundreds of civilians. At the height of the war, more than 1 million Lebanese people were displaced.
Hezbollah rockets forced some 60,000 from their homes in northern Israel, and killed 76 people in Israel, including 31 soldiers. Almost 50 Israeli soldiers were killed during operations inside Lebanon.
Here’s a look at the terms of the ceasefire and its prospects for ending hostilities over the long-term.
What does the ceasefire agreement say?
The agreement says that both Hezbollah and Israel will halt “offensive” military actions, but that they can act in self-defense, although it is not entirely clear how that term may be interpreted.
The Lebanese army is tasked with preventing Hezbollah and other militant groups from launching attacks into Israel. It is also required to dismantle Hezbollah facilities and weapons in southern Lebanon – activities that might eventually be expanded to the rest of Lebanon, although it is not explicit in the ceasefire agreement.
The United States, France, Israel, Lebanon and the UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon, known as UNIFIL, are responsible for overseeing implementation of the agreement.
“The key question is not whether the deal will hold, but what version of it will be implemented,” Maksad, the analyst, said.
Is the ceasefire being implemented?
Hezbollah has for the most part halted its rocket and drone fire into Israel, and Israel has stopped attacking Hezbollah in most areas of Lebanon. But Israel has launched regular airstrikes on what it says are militant sites in southern Lebanon and in the Bekaa Valley.
Israeli forces have so far withdrawn from two towns in southern Lebanon – Khiam and Shamaa. They remain in some 60 others, according to the International Organization for Migration, and around 160,000 Lebanese remain displaced.
Lebanon has accused Israel of repeatedly violating the ceasefire agreement and last week submitted a complaint to the UN Security Council that says Israel launched some 816 “ground and air attacks” between the start of the ceasefire and Dec. 22, 2023.
The complaint said the attacks have hindered the Lebanese army’s efforts to deploy in the south and uphold its end of the ceasefire agreement.
Israel says Hezbollah has violated the ceasefire hundreds of times and has also complained to the Security Council. It accused Hezbollah militants of moving ammunition, attempting to attack Israeli soldiers, and preparing and launching rockets toward northern Israel, among other things.
Until it hands over control of more towns to the Lebanese army, Israeli troops have been destroying Hezbollah infrastructure, including weapons warehouses and underground tunnels. Lebanese authorities say Israel has also destroyed civilian houses and infrastructure.
What happens after the ceasefire has been in place for 60 days?
Israel’s withdrawal from Lebanese towns has been slower than anticipated because of a lack of Lebanese army troops ready to take over, according to Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani, a military spokesman. Lebanon disputes this, and says it is waiting for Israel to withdraw before entering the towns.
Shoshani said Israel is satisfied with the Lebanese army’s control of the areas it has already withdrawn from, and that while it would prefer a faster transfer of power, security is its most important objective.
Israel does not consider the 60-day timetable for withdrawal to be “sacred,” said Harel Chorev, an expert on Israel-Lebanon relations at Tel Aviv University who estimates that Lebanon will need to recruit and deploy thousands more troops before Israel will be ready to hand over control.
Hezbollah officials have said that if Israeli forces remain in Lebanon 60 days past the start of the ceasefire, the militant group might return to attacking them. But Hezbollah Secretary General Naim Kassem said Wednesday that, for now, the group is holding off to give the Lebanese state a chance to “take responsibility” for enforcing the agreement.
Over the final two months of the war, Hezbollah suffered major blows to its leadership, weapons and forces from a barrage of Israeli airstrikes, and a ground invasion that led to fierce battles in southern Lebanon. The fall of Assad was another big setback.
“The power imbalance suggests Israel may want to ensure greater freedom of action after the 60-day period,” Maksad, the analyst, said. And Hezbollah, in its weakened position, now has a “strong interest” in making sure the deal doesn’t fall apart altogether “despite Israeli violations,” he said.
While Hezbollah may not be in a position to return to open war with Israel, it or other groups could mount guerilla attacks using light weaponry if Israeli troops remain in southern Lebanon, said former Lebanese army Gen. Hassan Jouni. And even if Israel does withdraw all of its ground forces, Jouni said, the Israeli military could could continue to carry out sporadic airstrikes in Lebanon, much as it has done in Syria for years.
Hamas wants Gaza ceasefire deal as soon as possible, senior official says
- Qatar, Egypt and the US have been engaged in months of back-and-forth talks between Israel and Hamas that have failed to end Gaza war
- The new talks will focus on agreeing on a permanent ceasefire and the withdrawal of Israeli forces, senior Hamas official Basem Naim
CAIRO: Hamas said a new round of indirect talks on a Gaza ceasefire resumed in Qatar’s Doha on Friday, stressing the group’s seriousness in seeking to reach a deal as soon as possible, senior Hamas official Basem Naim said.
The new talks will focus on agreeing on a permanent ceasefire and the withdrawal of Israeli forces, he added.
Mediators Qatar, Egypt and the US have been engaged in months of back-and-forth talks between Israel and Hamas that have failed to end more than a year of devastating conflict in Gaza.
A key obstacle to a deal has been Israel’s reluctance to agree to a lasting ceasefire.
On Thursday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said he had authorized Israeli negotiators to continue talks in Doha.
In December, Qatar expressed optimism that “momentum” was returning to the talks following Donald Trump’s election victory in the United States.
But a war of words then broke out with Hamas accusing Israel of setting “new conditions” while Israel accused Hamas of creating “new obstacles” to a deal.
In its Friday statement, Hamas said it reaffirmed its “seriousness, positivity and commitment to reaching an agreement as soon as possible that meets the aspirations and goals of our steadfast and resilient people.
