Fearing Expulsion of West Bank Palestinians, Jordan Dispatches Troops to Border

Israel’s actions in Gaza and the occupied West Bank threaten relations with neighboring Jordan despite a peace treaty signed in 1994.

Israeli soldiers keep guard in the Jordan Valley, the eastern-most part of the Israeli-occupied West Bank that borders Jordan on June 26, 2019. Ammar Awad/Reuters

Amman has stepped up its military presence along its border with the Israeli-occupied West Bank amid fears that the Jewish state may try to expel Palestinians into Jordan’s territory.

“Any displacement [of Palestinians into Jordan] … will be viewed as a declaration of war [by Israel] and a material breach of the peace treaty,” Jordanian Prime Minister Bisher Khasawneh said on Nov. 21.