Word: assads
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...region and underscored Hussein's longtime desire to protect his small kingdom by building strong alliances. Yet the maneuver also deepened divisions within the Arab world. Syria and Libya violently denounced Jordan's decision, while moderate states like Saudi Arabia quietly clucked disapproval. Syrian President Hafez Assad most fears a realignment among Arab nations that would shift power away from Damascus and create a new atmosphere of tolerance in the Arab community for Egypt's separate peace with Israel. "This is a treacherous stab in the back of the Arab struggle and an open plot against...
Meanwhile, Hussein was finding his own reasons for renewing links with Cairo. Eternally suspicious of Syria's Assad, he grew increasingly alarmed as Syria attempted to supplant Egypt as the most influential Arab power. Hussein was especially angered by what he considered to be Syria's attempt to gain control of the movement for Palestinian nationalism. In May 1983, Damascus fueled the fires of revolt within the Palestine Liberation Organization against its leader, Yasser Arafat. Then last November, Syria encouraged Palestinian rebels to besiege Arafat in the Lebanese port city of Tripoli. The P.L.O. chief finally escaped...
...Egypt. Last December, Amman signed a trade agreement with Cairo, reducing import barriers between the two countries. Meanwhile, Arafat met with both Mubarak and Hussein; by July, he had sufficiently rebuilt his authority within the P.L.O. to call a Palestine National Council meeting for Sept. 25 in Algiers. Assad, alarmed that Arafat might use the occasion to diminish the Syrian leader's influence in the P.L.O., flew to Algiers last month to pressure Algerian President Chadli Bendjedid into canceling the P.L.O. get-together. Chadli agreed. Hussein was so dismayed by the Syrian President's heavyhanded interference that...
...been kidnaped. (Late last week, Reuters Correspondent Jonathan Wright was released unharmed by unidentified gunmen after being held for 23 days.) All these terrorist incidents, coming at a time when Syria was trying to bring some kind of order to Lebanon, have embarrassed the Damascus government of President Hafez Assad. Worse, they bring with them the possibility of U.S. retaliation. The Syrians thus have reason to be annoyed with their onetime surrogates but obviously have not managed to check the terrorist activities...
...current status is still some thing of a mystery. Responding to Tlas' statement, one of Rifaat's aides declared that the Vice President was in Geneva for health reasons, and would return to Damascus "very soon." Despite the confusing signals, one fact seemed clear: Hafez Assad shows no signs of needing, let alone wanting, a successor...