The reports out of Jordan about the attempted coup caught the public in Israel off guard, having grown accustomed to decades of governmental stability in the neighboring kingdom. Jordanian authorities have arrested dozens of senior officials, including members of the royal family, while the former crown prince himself, Hamzah, the son of former King Hussein and his fourth wife, Queen Noor, is under house arrest in his palace in the capital Amman – reports the monarchy has already denied.
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The wave of arrests didn't surprise any senior Israeli officials familiar with the inner workings of the Jordanian royal family – which, like any royal family, is rife with frictions and competing ambitions of one day seizing the throne. Whether Prince Hamzah truly attempted to overthrow the king or not is not earthshattering news in and of itself, as there have been previous coup attempts against King Abdullah II. The late King Hussein, the father of Hamzah and Abdullah, also faced his share of coup attempts. In 1999, as he was on his death bed dying from cancer, he stripped his brother Hassan, who had been the crown prince since 1965, of all his authorities, transferring them to his son, Abdullah, who inherited the throne.
Senior Jordanian officials said at the time that Prince Hassan was stripped of power because of intelligence reports that reached the dying king's ears, whereby his brother was already laying the groundwork to replace him on the throne. Allegedly, Hassan also wanted to ensure that in the wake of Hussein's death the crown wouldn't transfer to his son Abdullah II, and then to one of his two sons born to Queen Noor, Hamzah and Hisham – who were born a year apart in 1980 and 1981, respectively.
However, although Queen Noor tabbed Hamzah as the future head of the royal family to eventually succeed Abdullah II, and worked vigorously to make that happen, King Abdullah II, who named his half-brother Hamzah crown prince in 2000, stripped him of his title four years later and instead named his son, Hussein, as his successor – to the chagrin of Queen Noor.
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