HUSSEIN

born Nov. 14, 1935, Amman, Transjordan [now Jordan] died Feb. 7, 1999, Amman King Hussein in full Hussein ibn Talal king of Jordan from 1953 to 1999. His reign marked the advent of the modern kingdom of Jordan and his policies greatly increased the Jordanian standard of living. A member of the Hashimite dynasty, he was considered by pious Muslims to be a direct descendant of the Prophet Muhammad (Ahl al-Bayt). Educated partly in England, Hussein succeeded his father, King Talal, who was declared unfit to rule by parliament because of mental illness in 1952 and abdicated in favour of his eldest son, Hussein ibn Talal. Hussein was crowned king the next year on his 18th birthday. His policies fostered slow but steady economic progress, though he was sometimes forced to depend on financial aid from the West. Hussein's base of support was his country's indigenous Bedouin tribesmen. Because the Palestinian majority in Jordan felt no attachment to his dynasty, Hussein strengthed the military establishment to assert the authority of the crown over that of Parliament. Hussein's socially conservative policies and his alignment with the Western powers were often criticized by other Arab leaders as well as by his domestic opposition. Thus, popular demonstrations, especially in the West Bank, and political unrest precluded his joining the pro-Western mutual defense treaty between Great Britain, Turkey, Iran, and Iraq known as the Baghdad Pact (1955), which he had helped initiate. He was also forced in 1956 to dismiss General John Bagot Glubb, the British officer who commanded the Arab Legion (Jordanian army). With American aid he steadily expanded and modernized his military forces, but Israel's military victory over Jordan in the Arab-Israeli War of June 1967 was a severe setback to Hussein's regime, resulting as it did in the loss of the West Bank to Israel and the influx of more Palestinian refugees into Jordan. After the war Hussein's rule was threatened by the military forces of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), who based themselves in Jordan to carry out guerrilla raids against Israel. In September 1970 full-scale warfare broke out between the PLO and Hussein's army in a struggle for control of the country. Hussein's army succeeded in completely expelling the PLO's forces from Jordan in 1971. In the following years Hussein steered a difficult course: he refrained from confronting Israel militarily, he mended relations with the PLO, and he sought both closer ties with and financial aid from Saudi Arabia and other moderate Arab states. He also maintained good relations with the United States and Great Britain. In 1988 Hussein surrendered Jordan's claim to the disputed West Bank, as well as its role in representing the Palestinians living there, to the PLO. In the wake of the Israel-PLO accords of 1993, Hussein on October 26, 1994, signed a bilateral peace treaty normalizing relations between Jordan and Israel. At Hussein's death, he was succeeded by his eldest son, Abdullah, who became King Abdullah II. Hussein's autobiography, Uneasy Lies the Head, was published in 1962.