Word: wasfi
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Suddenly disenchanted with the ineffectual, corrupt administration of his Premier, Bahjat Talhouni, Hussein fired his entire government. As his new Premier, Hussein chose a tough ex-army officer, Wasfi Tal, 41, who promptly gathered an entirely new Jordanian team, including six graduates from such institutions as Yale and Princeton. Like the King, he was obviously impressed by Washington. Said Wasfi fal: "We are beginning a New Frontier for Jordan...
Budgeting for continuing U.S. aid through 1966. Wasfi Tal wants to spend $357 million to make Jordan self-sufficient in food, develop its small potash and phosphate industry, increase its annual tourist earnings from $11 million to $50 million, and provide new jobs for 90,000 unemployed. He pledges that Jordan's notoriously inefficient civil service will be overhauled from top to bottom...
...would be happiest inspecting Jordan's trees. He is a graduate of Beirut's American University, fought as a British army captain during the war, later served for a spell in the Syrian army, returned to Jordan to become a civil servant. In the tax department. Wasfi Tal is remembered with awe for trying to make rich Jordanians pay their taxes. In the last ten years he has served, intermittently, as a Jordanian diplomat all over the Middle East, and adversaries loudly claim that he fomented anti-government plots in Syria. Lebanon and Iraq...
...political amnesty. He also ordered a probe of Jordanian officials suspected of corruption, promised to devote more care to the problems of the country's Palestinian population. All this pleased the unruly Palestinians, who saw other good omens: a heavy rainfall will mean good crops for 1962, and Wasfi's appointment coincided with the birth of Hussein's first son, Prince Abdullah, borne him by his 20-year-old British wife Toni. In the rejoicing, most Jordanians were prepared to forget that this was the first Hashemite of mixed descent in 38 generations...
...with crossed fingers, U.S. and British diplomats called it "a tremendous improvement," hoped that Jordan's brave efforts would last more than just a season. But last week also brought a reminder that Jordan's New Frontier is still troubled by old frontiers and old hates. While Wasfi Tal's new government started work, a harmless British eccentric, 56-year-old Ann Lasbury, on a visit to the Holy Land, tried to plant a "Repent" banner on the top of Mount Zion. which straddles the Israel-Jordan border. Fearing a dawn Israeli attack, a Jordanian sentry shot...