"An honourable peace, a balanced peace, a peace that will last": Signing the peace treaty between Israel and Jordan

א.1 | 1. Exploring the possibilities for an agreement with Jordan, September 1993 - April 1994

On October 26, 1994, the representatives of Israel and Jordan signed a peace treaty in a solemn ceremony near the Arava border crossing, north of Eilat, later known as the Yitzhak Rabin crossing. The ceremony was the culmination of a process that began with the two countries’ decision to move towards a new era in their relations – from rivalry to partnership and from hostility to peace. The agreement was very important to Israel: it ensured peace on the eastern border, its longest border, weakened the effect of the Arab boycott, and, above all, strengthened the security partnership with Jordan and made it visible. The partnership with Israel was also very important to Jordan, especially in the economic, political and security fields.

Israeli and Jordanian army officers shake hands during the  ceremony of signing the peace treaty, 26 October 1994. Photograph: Avi Ohayon, GPO

The signing ceremony was a historic moment. The citizens of Israel and Jordan who were invited to it, some of them veteran soldiers who had fought for years on opposite sides, and guests from all over the world, witnessed the agreement of the two countries to live side by side in peace. They saw the prime minister of Israel, Yitzhak Rabin, commander of the Harel Brigade in the War of Independence and chief of staff in the Six Day War, standing by the side of King Hussein ben Talal, the head of the Jordanian kingdom. Rabin and Hussein had known each other for many years, and Israel-Jordan relations had also begun much earlier, But every time an attempt was made to reach a formal agreement between them, another obstacle blocked the way. An example of these past contacts can be found in the appendix, which presents a secret meeting between Rabin and King Hussein and other leaders in 1975.

In this publication we present a collection of documents from recently declassified files, showing the difficulties that arose on the way to the agreement and how they were overcome. We also present many of the documents on a timeline, which illustrates the chain of events that led to the ceremony in the Arava. The starting point we have chosen is September 13, 1993. On that day, in Washington, Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) of the PLO – in the presence of Prime Minister Rabin and Yasser Arafat – signed a Declaration of Principles (DOP) on interim arrangements for Palestinian self-government, known as the first Oslo Accord. (See the publication of the Israel State Archives on “The road to Oslo“). The signing of the DOP removed an important obstacle on the way to the peace process with Jordan, and on the very next day, September 14, an agreed agenda was signed in Washington between the two countries for the continuation of the process (Document 1).

The timeline reflects the affinity between the two peace processes – the Jordanian and the Palestinian, which ran concurrently and influenced each other. The fact that the majority of Jordan’s population is Palestinian, and that there were economic and family ties between Jordan and the West Bank, ruled by Jordan until 1967, created a sense of obligation on the part of the Jordanians towards the Palestinians. The influence of the Palestinian issue on Israel-Jordan relations was also reflected in the Madrid Peace Conference at the end of October 1991, which brought together representatives of Israel, Syria, Lebanon, Egypt and a joint Jordanian-Palestinian delegation and marked the first official contacts between Israel and the Palestinians. Following the conference, talks were held in Washington between the Jordanian-Palestinian delegation and the Israeli delegation, headed by Government Secretary Elyakim Rubinstein and Abd al-Salam al-Majali, who was appointed prime minister of Jordan in May 1993. Many of the issues that would arise later in the negotiations were already discussed in Washington, and in fact the Agenda had already been agreed and initialled, but was not published. The Washington talks did not mature due to the opposition of the PLO, which wanted to control the Palestinian negotiations. With the signing of the Oslo Accord, the Jordanians were freed from their commitment to the Palestinians, and could focus on their own interests.

Elyakim Rubinstein (centre) and members of the Israeli delegation in Washington, October 1992. Seated on the right, the Jordanian delegate and water expert, Munther Hadadin. Photograph courtesy of Arie Zohar

But despite the lifting of the Palestinian veto, little progress was made in the first few months. At the end of September Rabin paid a secret visit to King Hussein in Aqaba, to explain why Israel had chosen to reach the Oslo Agreement, which had surprised and angered the Jordanians. He assured the king that Israel sought a speedy agreement with Jordan. This was followed by a secret meeting between Peres and King Hussein and his brother, Crown Prince Hassan, on November 2-3, 1993. At the meeting, the parties agreed on a non-binding document (Non-paper) initialled by Peres and Hussein, which was designed to ensure rapid progress towards a peace agreement, with an emphasis on economic cooperation. The following day the existence of the meeting was revealed in the Israeli media. This embarrassed Hussein on the eve of elections to the Jordanian Parliament, and he disowned the agreement (Document 2).

At the same time, trilateral talks between Israel, Jordan and the United States  opened on November 4, with the aim of advancing the negotiations. More about these conversations, which dealt with economic issues, can be seen in Files A-8081/17, A-8083/15.  Rubinstein also continued the bilateral talks with Fayez Tarawneh, the Jordanian ambassador to Washington, who had replaced al-Majali. However the teams encountered various difficulties. The leak about the Peres-Hussein meeting not only embarrassed Hussein, but also damaged Israel’s credibility. On February 25, 1994, the massacre of Muslim worshippers in the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron took place, which shocked the Arab world, temporarily halted talks with the Palestinians and posed another difficulty in the talks with the Jordanians (See the chapter on the massacre and its results in the ISA publication on the Cairo Agreement). After the massacre, and in response to it, the Hamas Islamic terrorist organization carried out two major suicide attacks in Afula and Hadera. Israel, for its part, accused Jordan of giving shelter to Hamas operatives (ibid., Document 96).

Another difficulty arose due to the American naval blockade of the port of Aqaba, Jordan’s only outlet to the sea. The blockade was imposed following Jordan’s support for Iraq in the Gulf War (1991) and the suspicion that the port was being used by Iraq to circumvent the sanctions against it. In light of the economic damage, the Jordanians began to condition the continuation of the talks with Israel on the lifting of the blockade (Document 3).

In order to break the stalemate, the Israeli team made efforts to keep contacts alive and examined different approaches. The Jordanian side, for its part, was still reserved in its attitude to a full peace agreement, and preferred to discuss specific problems between the two countries, mainly the questions of water distribution and determining the border. Arie Zohar, the Deputy Government Secretary, warned that discussing each issue separately would prevent the parties from reaching mutual concessions. He recommended a “package deal” based on consideration of the issues important to each side (Document 4).

Despite the efforts of the teams, the only issue where real progress was made was in dealing with the problem of flies. The residents of the Jordan Valley and the Arava suffered from large amounts of flies, due to the overuse of fertilizers by farmers on both sides of the border, and both sides had an interest in addressing the problem. Its extent can be learned from the multitude of documents on this subject (for example in Files GL-66302/11, GL-66302/18).

א.2 | 2. Breakthrough and a historic meeting in Washington, April - July 1994

In the spring of 1994, several events occurred that led to a breakthrough. The Jordanians reached agreement with the Americans on a solution to the naval blockade of Aqaba (Document 5). On May 4, the Cairo Agreement was signed between Israel and the PLO, establishing the Palestinian Authority in the Gaza Strip and Jericho. Shortly before that, an agreement that regulated economic relations between Israel and the PA (see the publication on the Cairo agreement) was signed in Paris, which did not take into account Jordanian interests in the West Bank. The Jordanians realized that not only could the Palestinians conduct independent negotiations with Israel, but they had also begun to bypass the Jordanians in their progress. Israel’s talks with Syria with American mediation were renewed at the same time, causing Hussein to fear that Jordan would be left behind (Document 7). In May 1994 Rabin and Hussein met secretly in London and discussed ways to move forward. The two agreed to begin public bilateral talks on a full peace agreement, which would be transferred from Washington to the Middle East. Hussein rejected the idea of talks in Egypt and suggested talks on the border between Jordan and Israel (Document 6).

Efraim Halevy, the deputy head of the Mossad and Rabin’s “faithful envoy” to King Hussein, played a central role in the secret contacts with the Jordanian leadership. Photograph: Avi Ohayon, GPO

These understandings accelerated the negotiations. Another significant event took place on June 22, 1994, when King Hussein and US President Bill (William) Clinton met at the White House. According to a source in the National Security Council, Clinton emphasized “that the United States wants to help Jordan, but also needs Jordan’s help, and to receive from the king something in the form of a significant public step, which will allow the president to go to Congress and ask for support for all those things that the king is interested in”, such as economic and military aid. This was conditional on the progress of the negotiations with Israel and on the transition to open contacts (Document 9). The report on the meeting shows that, as in the case of the naval blockade of Aqaba, some of the Jordanians’ interest in reaching agreement with Israel stemmed from the pressure exerted by the Americans, as well as the rewards they offered to Jordan, which wanted to solve the problem of its debts to the US and to open up new economic opportunities. Israel, for its part, supported Jordan’s requests, as long as it showed seriousness in the negotiations, and in June Halevy was sent to Washington to help.

In the summer the contacts gained significant momentum. On July 18, after preparatory meetings held at the beginning of the month, the negotiating teams of Israel and Jordan met openly for the first time in Ein Evrona in the Arava, in accordance with the agreement between Rabin and Hussein in May. The Jordanians insisted on meeting in a tent on the border itself, despite the harsh summer heat. Two days later, as part of the fifth tripartite meeting, Peres, US Secretary of State Warren Christopher and Prime Minister Al-Majali met at a hotel on the Dead Sea on the Jordanian side.

But the highlight was the meeting of Hussein and Rabin in Washington on July 25, in the presence of President Clinton, when the parties signed the Washington Declaration (Document 15). The declaration defined the end of the state of war between the two countries and agreed principles for negotiations towards a full peace agreement.

Prime Minister Rabin and King Hussein shake hands before signing the Washington Declaration, as President Clinton applauds, 25 July 1994. Photograph: Ya’acov Sa’ar, GPO

R-L, Leah Rabin, Queen Nur , Hilary Clinton, Yitzhak Rabin, King Hussein and President Clinton at a festive dinner in Washington, 25 July 1994. Photograph: Ya’acov Sa’ar, GPO

The following day, Rabin and Hussein spoke in a joint session of Congress. In his speech, Rabin spoke of the bitter war between Israel and its enemies in 1948; he added:

“Tomorrow I shall return to Jerusalem, the capital of the State of Israel and the heart of the Jewish people. Lining the road to Jerusalem are rusting hulks of metal – burnt-out, silent, cold. They are the remains of convoys which brought food and medicine to the war-torn and besieged city of Jerusalem forty-six years ago. For many of Israel’s citizens, their story is one of heroism, part of our national legend. For me and for my comrades-in-arms, every scrap of cold metal lying there by the wayside is a bitter memory…I remember them. I was their commander in war. For them this ceremony has come too late. What endures are their children, their comrades, their legacy.

Allow me a personal note. I, Military I.D. No. 30743, Retired General in the Israeli Defense Forces, consider myself to be a soldier in the army of peace today.

I, who served my country for 27 years as a soldier, I say to you, Your Majesty, the King of Jordan, and I say to you, our American friends: Today we are embarking on a battle which has no dead and no wounded, no blood and no anguish. This is the only battle which is a pleasure to wage: the battle of peace.”

On August 8, the countries formalized their new relations by opening a border crossing in the Arava, north of Eilat (Document 21).

א.3 | 3. From the Washington Declaration to the peace treaty and beyond, August - November 1994

Until now, the teams and the political leaders had discussed the general principles that would guide the future agreement. They now had to translate these principles into practical details and to decide on the border lines, on the distribution of the Jordan river water, on security arrangements, etc. In both open meetings and secret ones behind the scenes, the parties managed to reach certain agreements, but a number of disputes remained (Document 26).

Delegation leaders Elyakim Rubinstein (R) and Fayez Tarawneh (L) shake hands at the start of the Dead Sea talks, 9 August 1994. Photograph: Zvika Yisraeli, GPO.

Jordan tried repeatedly to raise the question of the Palestinian refugees, especially the DPs from 1967 in Jordan, but Israel made it clear that it was not willing to discuss it, except as part of the permanent settlement with the Palestinians. The status of Jerusalem was another sensitive subject. Traditionally, Hussein and the Hashemite dynasty considered themselves responsible for the Muslim Waqf and the day-to-day management of Muslim religious institutions in Jerusalem and the West Bank. Some people in Israel were afraid that Israeli approval of “the present special role of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan in Muslim Holy Shrines in Jerusalem”, as specified in the Washington Declaration, and later in the peace treaty itself, would threaten its sovereignty in Jerusalem and its status in the holy places. See for example the protest of the chief rabbi of Haifa, Rabbi Shear Yeshuv HaCohen, in his letter to the Chief Rabbi, Rabbi Israel Meir Lau (Document 17).

Rabbi Shear Yishuv Hacohen. Photograph: Wikimedia

Israel could accept Jordan’s demand to maintain its status in Jerusalem, because this was a continuation of the status quo established after the Six Day War (Document 37). But the Palestinians also considered themselves a party to the matter. According to Israel’s agreement with the Palestinians, the fate of Jerusalem would also be discussed in future talks on the permanent settlement. Arafat, for his part, decided to appoint a Palestinian minister for the Wakf, to be responsible for religious affairs in the West Bank and Jerusalem. At the end of September, Jordan came to the conclusion that it was better to limit the confrontation with the Palestinians and to concentrate on the main issues. With the approval of the Jordanian government, King Hussein decided to abolish the religious role of Jordan on the West Bank, but to maintain that role in Jerusalem.

During August and September, especially towards the end of the month, important meetings were held between the parties in an attempt to bridge the remaining gaps. On the issue of security arrangements, the parties managed to make consistent progress, and this was helped by the fact that the border between Israel and Jordan had been relatively quiet for many years. The border and water issues were more difficult. As for water distribution, there was clearly a shortage of water in the area, and according to the Israeli negotiating team, giving Jordan the quantities that it demanded would cause damage to the Israeli water system. The border question was even more complicated. It turned out that, with the exception of a very short section in the Eilat area, the border between the two countries had never been officially marked on the ground, and both sides brought maps to the talks showing various border lines which were in their favour (Document 10). The problem on Israel’s side was particularly serious. It turned out that there were agricultural areas and water wells in the Arava that over the years had “crept” into Jordanian territory, or as Elyakim Rubinstein described it, paraphrasing a popular song: “Suddenly a fence gets up in the morning and feels that it is a border and begins to walk…” (Document 33), so that even according to the lines that Israel was willing to accept, there were cultivated areas that it might have to relinquish. These two issues were central to Jordan, and they are clearly expressed in the correspondence between Rabin and Hussein. The king and the Jordanian team claimed that their people would not forgive them if they gave up an inch of Jordanian land, or their right to Jordanian water. Rabin, for his part, found it very difficult to give up cultivated land and water sources.

A limerick written by Judge Rubinstein in the spirit of his Hebrew witticism, given to the editors while preparing this publication.

In October, the teams came close to reaching agreement on the border in the Arava, on the basis of an exchange of territories. In secret meetings, progress was also made regarding two special areas in the agreement: Moshav Tzofar in the Arava and Naharayim (Bakura) in the north of the Jordan Valley (Bekaa).  Nevertheless, the teams realized that these disputes could only be resolved by the political leaders, and in fact by King Hussein and Prime Minister Rabin themselves. Already after the failure of Peres’ contacts in November 1993, Rabin realized that he had to take charge of the contacts with Hussein. The correspondence between them indicates a warm relationship. In the files declassified for this publication, you can find the greetings that Rabin sent to Hussein on the anniversary of his accession to the throne, and even a letter of condolence that Hussein sent to Rabin the day after the tragic  death of kidnapped IDF soldier Nachshon Waxman on October 14 (Document 32).

But the most interesting documents are the letters that the leaders sent to each other at the beginning of October. Despite the diplomatic language in which they were written, the letters  show their efforts to bridge the gaps and to harness their personal connection and mutual respect to this end. In his letter of 2 October, Hussein shares with Rabin his concern that the efforts made by Jordan since the Washington Declaration to promote the establishment of “a warm peace between our countries and peoples” would be wasted. “The question that has caused me sleepless nights since [our] last meeting is; are we facing an insurmountable crisis that could destroy all we have done…” In his answer, Rabin notes that he was moved by the king’s eloquence and depth of feeling and expresses understanding of his difficulties, but adds that he too has his limitations: “If God forbid, we were to fail, what would we tell our children? That we could not work out an honourable, credible and sensible compromise? […] In the final analysis, you and I, Your Majesty, will have to make political decisions.” (Documents 26, 29).

The decisions were indeed made. At a meeting on October 16-17 in Amman, the two leaders reached compromises over the border and water distribution.  After an exhausting night of negotiations, in which Peres and Prince Hassan also took part, Rabin and Al-Majali initialled the draft of the agreement. The Jordanians were convinced that it was better to develop sustainable water sources, instead of receiving large amounts of water from the Jordan River. After agreement was reached on the exchange of territories, the border line between the two countries was also determined with two exceptions: Zofar and Naharayim. These were not settlements, but areas of agricultural land worked by Moshav Tzofar and the Ashdot Ya’akov kibbutzim. In the case of Naharayim, some of the land was also bought by Jews in the pre-State period and was privately owned (Document 18). Israel accepted Jordan’s claim of sovereignty over these territories, and Jordan, for its part, accepted Israel’s desire not to give up the agricultural land. A temporary “special regime” was agreed upon for 25 years, with the possibility of extension. This was not a lease agreement, as sometimes described, but a unique arrangement, which would allow farmers to enter and work the territory freely, allow the Israel Police to enter it when necessary, etc.

The first page of the draft peace treaty with Jordan, October 17, 1994. File A 412/4

Rabin, Peres and Rubinstein described the last stages of the negotiations at a special meeting of the government that day (Document 33). A week later, Rabin described to the Knesset how that night he saw the lights of Jerusalem from the balcony of the king’s palace in Amman – so near and yet so far away, separated by 46 years of emnity. The Knesset approved the treaty by a large majority.

On October 26, 1994, Prime Minister Rabin, Prime Minister Al-Majali, and US President Clinton signed the peace treaty in an impressive ceremony at the Arava crossing. Foreign Minister Peres, Russian Foreign Minister Andrey Kozyrev, and Secretary of State Christopher added their signatures.

Two copies of the treaty are held in the ISA: Files MFA 11682/11, MFA 11780/11.

Releasing balloons in the colours of the flags of Israel and Jordan during the signing ceremony, October 26, 1994. Photograph: Ya’akov Sa’ar, GPO

The next day, Clinton made a speech in the Knesset. At another ceremony which took place two weeks later, on November 10, at Beit Gabriel on the banks of the Sea of ​​Galilee, Rabin and Hussein exchanged ratification documents for the peace agreement, thus making it a fait accompli. In his speech, Hussein expressed his belief that it was “an honorable peace, a balanced peace, a peace that will last, because from the first instant it was our determination to make it so.”

Our timeline ends here, but the journey to establish relations between Israel and Jordan had only just begun: the two countries would establish a committee to implement the agreement and reach additional agreements, embassies would be opened in Tel Aviv and Amman, and Israeli tourists would visit the city of Petra…

Among the documents we have included in the timeline you will find secret letters exchanged between the leaders, Foreign Ministry cables, summaries by the Israeli negotiating team and more. A small number of these documents were taken from files which could not be declassified, and the original file number does not appear. The timeline focuses on the aspects we saw as most significant: the influence of the Palestinian channel and the Syrian channel on the talks, the important contribution of President Clinton and the American peace team, the relationship between King Hussein and Prime Minister Rabin, and the efforts of the negotiation teams in general, and the Israeli team in particular, in the search for the saving formula. We attach a full list of documents in the link on the right, and a list of files, where you can find additional historical materials about the period. You are invited to go over the timeline, get an impression of the documents, and read the files that we have declassified for you.

PM Rabin and King Hussein on the shores of the Sea of Galilee after the ratification of the Israel-Jordan peace treaty, 10 November 1994. They are accompanied by Foreign Minister Peres; Eitan Haber, the head of Rabin’s bureau; Shimon Sheves, the director-general of the Prime Minister’s Office and other PMO staff. Photograph: Ya’acov Sa’ar, GPO

We would like to express our heartfelt gratitude to retired Supreme Court Judge Elyakim Rubinstein, then Government Secretary and Head of the Delegation for the Peace Talks with Jordan, to Arie Zohar, then Deputy Government Secretary, who also gave us access to photographs from his personal collection, and to Einat Shlain, Director of the International Cooperation Department at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and former Ambassador to Jordan, for the time they dedicated to us and the extensive knowledge and personal perspective they shared with us, which contributed greatly to this publication.