Our Last Best Chance_ The Pursuit of Peace in a Time of Peril - King Abdullah II [61]
In early January 1999 my father left the United States for London. On January 7, I landed at Heathrow and drove through the freezing rain to his house near Ascot, some fifteen miles southwest of the airport. The house was bustling with family. I could tell he wanted to speak to me privately, but it was hard to find a quiet moment. Every time I went to see him another family member would show up. Even so, we had that comfortable feeling that fathers and sons have when not saying much and just enjoying the closeness of each other’s company. On my last day in London I had hoped at last to speak to him privately, but my uncle Crown Prince Hassan paid a surprise visit. He had been facing quite a bit of criticism back home for not visiting my father at the Mayo Clinic. Although my father was still seething about Prince Hassan’s army overreach, he managed to hide his anger during the visit. I finally succeeded in finding a few moments alone with him that night. “Stay here for a couple of days,” he said. “Sir,” I said—I never stopped calling him that—“I have really got to get back to Jordan.” I told him that I was in charge of a major element of security for his arrival. He sighed and said we would catch up in Amman.
Back in Jordan I began making arrangements for my father’s return. He had been away from the country for almost six months, and hundreds of thousands of Jordanians wanted to welcome him home following what they believed was a successful cancer treatment. The plan was for him to travel by car from the airport through the streets of Amman to his home in the Hummar district, northwest of the city. His house was called Bab Al Salam, which means “gate of peace” in Arabic. It was named after one of the entrances to the Grand Mosque in Mecca, which my family had ruled for many generations, until Abdulaziz bin Abdulrahman Al Saud of the Nejd took over the Hijaz in 1924 and went on to found present-day Saudi Arabia.
Over the next ten days speculation continued to mount that my father had decided to change the line of succession. Several people came up to me and hinted conspiratorially that I was a candidate. I really felt it was none of their business. Over the years I had avoided meddling in politics and had devoted myself to my military career. I was not about to change that now.
On January 19, 1999, my father landed at Marka airport near Amman. He had flown his aircraft, a Gulfstream IV, all the way from London. Dressed in a dark suit and wearing the kouffiyeh, the traditional Jordanian red-checkered head scarf, he stepped out of the plane. The scene on the tarmac was emotional, with hundreds of people gathered to welcome my father and thousands more lining the streets of Amman. The night back in July when he had told me his cancer had recurred, I had a dream that he would return to his country and our people would turn out in the thousands, as they had in 1992 after his first illness. That dream came true, but in real life there would not be a happy ending.
There were tears streaming down my wife Rania’s face, and I was trying as best I could to keep my emotions in check. But not all emotions on display that day were genuine, as family members, politicians, and members of the Royal Court lined up to welcome their king home. The way my father handled the welcoming line was a quiet lesson in statecraft. Some people he kissed, some he hugged, some he shook hands with, and some he walked straight past, not even acknowledging. He knew who had been loyal while he was away—and who had not. One family member tried to kiss him as they shook hands, and my father pushed him away. Realizing my father knew of his hypocrisy,