King Hussein's federation plan

King Hussein's federation plan (in Arabic: المملكة العربية المتحدة) was a political program proposed by King Hussein of Jordan during a radio broadcast held on March 15, 1972 which aimed to establish a Jordanian-Palestinian federation named the "United Arab Kingdom" on the condition that Israel would concede the control of East Jerusalem to the Jordanian-Palestinian federation so that it would become the capital of its Palestinian federal district. Hussein's proposal was rejected by most of the involved parties soon after it was declared.

On 15 March 1972, King Hussein of Jordan revealed his plan for a "United Arab Kingdom", which would be a federation consisting of two federal districts – the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan and a Palestinian federal district which would be located in the West Bank region that was under Jordanian control between 1948 and 1967 and that would have East Jerusalem as its capital. According to the proposal the two districts of the federation would be autonomous, except for the military affairs, foreign affairs and security affairs which would be run by a central government located in Amman.

Nevertheless, King Hussein conditioned the establishment of the UAK in achieving a peace agreement between Israel and Jordan.

Ultimately King Hussein's proposal was ruled out after it was rejected both by Israel and by the PLO and other Arab states that strongly opposed the plan.

In the eyes of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) the plan's fulfillment would have meant an end to the Palestinian struggle and a denial of their own objectives. Their strong opposition was expressed in a statement issued by the PLO's executive committee, who met immediately after the announcement of the plan:

The Palestinian National Council went further, calling for the overthrow of King Hussein, "[we must] engage in a struggle to liberate Jordan from the subservient royalist regime which is a mask for the effective Zionist domination of the East Bank and acts as a hired guardian of the Zionist occupation of Palestine".

...
Wikipedia