The Great Powers and the Arab World • 315threat of communist aggression. Nasir in Egypt and the Ba'th Party in Syria
vehemently denounced the Eisenhower Doctrine, whereas Iraq's Nuri
al-Sa'id, a veteran Arab nationalist who collaborated with the British, en¬
dorsed it.
The struggle between the neutralist and pro-Western Arabs climaxed in
Jordan. The annexation of the rump of Arab Palestine (the West Bank) by
what had been Transjordan strained that country. The Palestinians were
more urbanized, educated, and politicized than the Transjordanians. Having
lost their land in 1948, they hated not only Israel but the Western powers,
who they blamed for creating and sustaining it, and the Arab leaders, who
had failed to destroy it. Many Palestinians in Jordan loathed Hashimite rule;
they viewed King Husayn as a playboy propped up by his Arab Legion with
its bedouin soldiers and British officers.
Seeking Palestinian support, Husayn had given in to Arab demands in
1955 to keep Jordan out of the Baghdad Pact. Early in 1956 he dismissed
General Glubb as head of the Arab Legion. Free elections in October re¬
sulted in a popular front cabinet that included Arab nationalists and even a
communist minister. Britain began pulling its troops out of Jordan and
stopped subsidizing its government, but Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Syria
agreed to take up the slack. Ba'thist and pro-Nasir officers within Jordan's
army began replacing royalists; early in April 1957 they threatened to seize
Husayn's palace. A few days later the Arab nationalists tried to capture a
major Jordanian army base, but the king rallied loyal troops to his side and
personally faced down the threat to his rule. He proceeded to dismiss the
popular front cabinet, declare martial law, dissolve parliament, and set up
what amounted to a royal dictatorship. Dulles then declared that Jordan's
territorial integrity was a vital US interest and sent ships and troops to the
eastern Mediterranean. In effect, the Eisenhower Doctrine was first used to
thwart an Arab nationalist takeover in Jordan. Even with American back¬
ing, Husayn's stance was precarious. Palestinians, especially the refugees,
still opposed the monarchy, which was being assailed in Radio Cairo's
widely heard broadcasts.
Meanwhile, the Lebanese government of President Kamil Sham'un ac¬
cepted the Eisenhower Doctrine, overriding Arab nationalist protests that
this action would violate Lebanon's neutrality. Pro-Western politicians,
mainly Christians, held more power than the Arab nationalists, most of
whom were Muslim. Some detractors accused Sham'un's government of
increasing its power by rigging the 1957 parliamentary elections, in which
many opposition leaders failed to get reelected. Arab nationalists, backed
by Palestinian refugees in Lebanon and by Egypt and Syria, opposed the