The Arabic X-File : The Agent King

Mohamed Hassanein Haikel is under a huge regional fire , he is always under huge local fire for opinions against the current regime. Haikel is currently widely by  Jordan and his weekly TV show on Al Jazeera is said to cause a silent diplomatic crisis between Amman and Doha ,in fact it caused a diplomatic crisis.

The last two episodes of “With Haikel : Life experience” on Al Jazeera channel caused a lot of anger in Jordan as the famous journalist who used to be from the Egyptian ruling regime members in the last century especially in 1950s and 1960s said that late King Hussein of Jordan used to be on the CIA monthly payroll !! Yes the late King according to Haikel used to pay a salary from the CIA in order to be in the West side.

What sources did Haikel use this time ?? Well they are not his usual British or American documents but it is Ben Bradlee’s memoirs “A Good Life: Newspapering and Other Adventures”. According to that book when Bradley was the executive editor of the Washington Post he knew from the famous Bob Woodward that an Arab leader was taking a monthly salary from the CIA in 1970s , you got to admit that that was a scoop , they decided to follow up the matter especially that during that time Woodward’s had only one source that did not reveal to him much information. Bradlee called the White House and after some calls he had a meeting with Carter who told him that he would put the United States in a very bad position if he published this info revealing the name of the Arab leader who was King Hussein. Carter told Bradlee that that monthly salary lasted for 20 years and that Jordan was a vital ally to the West during the 1960s ..etc. In the end Carter asked Bradlee kindly not to publish still the newspaper published the news without names or details. Ironically it was published before the meeting of Carter with King Hussein.

This was published in Bradlee’s book “A Good life” in pages 424-426.

Is it shocking !!?? It is not to me nor to anyone with my all respect to the Jordanian people who knows the history of the late King very well and his political position through out his ruling years. For God Sake the man himself confessed that he was the Arab ruler who informed the Israelis that the Egyptians and Syrians were going to launch a military attack on the 6th of October 1973 , it is undeniable incident that does not leave too much doubt in anyone about on which side that king used to play and how far he was going to. Already FYI Late President Sadat did not want to tell King Hussein about the date of the attack like the Syrians because he knew that he would go and tell the whole world. He only tell him on the same day where it would be useless to inform Israel anything. The regime in Egypt knew very whom they are dealing with and please do not tell me it is the Nasserite era legacy because in 1973 President Sadat was in charge and he got rid all of the Nasserite era men in 1971.  For God Sake I can’t forget how the late King was crying on Rabin’s funeral , the man did not cry on his own father in same way and it is something well known !!!

Bradlee is still alive , Woodward is still alive and most importantly Carter is still alive , those people can be reached and asked about the accuracy of these allegations if the Jordanians are so keen to clear their king’s image then they must seek the truth from these men not to attack Haikel.

of course the Egyptian regime Press found it an excellent opportunity to start their usual attack on Haikel forgetting that the official Egyptian regime press always attacked King Hussein from time to time when Jordan does not have the same views with Cairo calling him a traitor working for Israeli. In fact Al Gomhouria chief in editor opened his fire on Haikel last Thursday in full page Op-ed forgetting that in that same old newspaper the late King was accused over and over by treason.

I do not defend Haikel , he has his own fans from the  Gulf to the Ocean to defend him but what I am defending the truth. Haikel is not angelic , it is enough that he was leading Nasser entourage.

Haikel does not deserve all that attack especially those who accused were Bob Woodward and Ben Bradley!! Why do not they have their share from the Jordanian attack ?? I think the Jordanian people were misled on propose by making them believe that Only Haikel is accusing their king , not all the people in Jordan watched Haikel’s show on that particular Thursday !!

I do not know why some Jordanians find it so hard to admit that their late King was not the greatest patriotic Arab king in the 20th century , I do not find it hard or insulting to say those  who ruled Egypt were not that good in the 20th century starting from Abbas Halmi II to Mubarak !! Already if the Hashemites rule is downed some day in Jordan , all those accusations will be brought up as an evidence of how corrupted this royal family is as it is the custom of the revolutions and coups but this time there will be lots and lots of evidences.

The Jordanian People should not be angry because Jordan is not only the Hashemites or King Hussein and if they believe so then they are totally wrong.

Being a small country against Nasser nationalist power is not a justification for Hussein’s blind alliance to the West in 20th century.

BY the way I forget to tell you that to avoid any trouble in Amman Al Jazeera is going to air a special interview with some Jordanian ex-official where he would speak about the Jordanian-Israeli relations..etc by documents , he can say whatever he wants , it is well known history , I do not know how he would justify how his late king informed the Israelis with the time of the 6th October war

Links :

• The script of that episode that caused uproar “The Arabic and Jordanian positions in 1967” , it is the episode that caused uproar
• The script of the second episode in role ”The Hashemites and their American-British relations” , he repeated what he said in the previous episode in this episode again

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