No Signal
I am sitting in a café close to As-Salt drinking mint tea and looking across the Jordan Valley and the mountain range beyond where the sun is slowly setting. It is a remarkable sight, and one I wish to return to, so I take out my phone to save the café. Trying to find it on google maps I check my location and am surprised to discover that according to my phone, I am currently at Queen Alia Airport, about 50km away from where I actually am. Probably some malfunction with my phone I tell myself, so I ask my friend to find the café for me. After a minute he looks up at me from his phone in confusion and tells me his location on google maps is at Queen Alia Airport. So not a coincidence then. After some discussion as to why both of our phones are not working, we ask a local. She explains to us that Israel is jamming GPS signals in the border region between Israel and Jordan since April, when Iran attacked Israel with missiles and drones. For Israel it is a way to protect itself from GPS guided missiles. Having seen Iranian misses fly across the Jordanian sky myself, I can at the very least testify that this is protection against an existing threat. Still, it is something that I never heard about. It is also quite inconvenient. The signal is usually jammed in a 20km wide corridor along the 482km border with Israel, although it is happening most consistently in the North of Jordan. On some days the jamming reaches as far as Amman, leaving millions without GPS signal and thus complicating navigation. Especially among cab drivers who rely on GPS navigation for their income this has led to a lot of frustration.

Like the jamming of GPS in Jordan, in this Post I want to draw your attention to the consequences of the war in Gaza, and now in Lebanon, which have largely gone unnoticed and unmentioned outside the Levant. What I discuss here is undoubtedly less severe than the killing of tens of thousands of civilians, but it deserves attention, nonetheless. I already talked about the jammed GPS signals and will now share a story about the Jordanian tourist industry. Lastly, I want to share my impression on the sentiments regarding the end of the wat and the future of this conflict. The three impressions are by far not all unmentioned consequences of war and yet I hope they will give you a better understanding of what is happening right now. In addition, they will illustrate to you how divers the impacts of conflict can be and make you look closer when considering other wars and conflicts and their consequences.   

War and the Jordanian Tourist Industry
Two weeks ago, I went on a short trip to visit Wadi Mujib and Dana with some friends. After visiting Wadi Mujib and Wadi Al Hasa on the first day, we arrived late in the evening in a small village close to Dana, where we had booked a cabin. The host welcomed us warmly and after dinner and some small talk, he expressed his gratitude choosing to book one of his cabins for the night. His business consisted of eight small cabins to sleep in which he had built around 3 years ago together with his brothers. He was and still is working as a teacher. Initially he wanted to make the cabins his main source of income and quit working as a teacher and in the first two years after building the cabins it seemed like the plan would work out. The cabins where often all booked and even in winter there were plenty of tourists coming. He hosted people from all around the world, eating, singing and dancing with them in the communal building we had eaten in as well and were now having tea. The income was covering the investment he and his brothers had made to construct the cabins. Then, in the evening of October 7th, 2023, our host recalled how his phone was buzzing with more and more cancelations. He told us that at first, he thought it was coincidence, that a few people decided to cancel their trip at the same time, but the cancelations kept coming. The next morning, he read the news and immediately understood what was happening. At the end of the week, most of the cabins were empty and stayed that way until now. He has guests around once a month now, usually foreigners who work or live in Jordan. We were his first guests since August. He expressed his hope for the war to end soon. Most importantly so that killing of civilians ends but also because then tourists will return to Jordan.

With its rich culture, religion, beautiful nature and long history, Jordan has the potential to attract tourists from all around the world. Yet the conflict in the region deters many from coming. After a sharp drop in tourism after the Arab spring, the industry recovered, benefitting from Jordans stability. State, businesses and private individuals invested in accommodating, entertaining and educating tourists. Much of the infrastructure that was developed in the past decade is now unused. Overall, the number of tourists has decreased by 7% in 2024 compared to the same period in 2023, causing losses of around 350 million USD. The losses are however very unevenly spread. The number of tourists from other Arab countries has barely decreased while the number of American tourists halved and the number of European tourists decreased by 40% compared to last year. This means that sectors catering to these tourists are hit particularly hard, like our host who mainly accommodated European tourists before the war started.

Resignment and Hopelessness
The War has also led to a less tangible change. A change in mood. A Jordanian friend who worked in peace initiatives for 30 years, told me that he had lost hope to ever find out what peace in the Levant looks like. He has largely given up on peace initiatives and now focuses on the wellbeing of the Jordanian people. It is an attitude that I encounter almost daily. A large part of Jordan’s population has Palestinian roots, and they closely watch as their country shrinks, and their people are being murdered in Gaza and the West Bank. There is outrage but it there is also resignment and hopelessness. Whenever I bring up the topic with people from the Levant, they all tell me the same. Violence will not bring them peace and justice, but diplomacy and negotiation will not either. The only reasonable course of action then is to continue with life. Try to take care of family and friends who are affected or put in danger by the war. Attend the weekly protest in Amman’s city centre where the demands for peace and justice which have been repeated for decades sound more unachievable and hollow every week. It is disheartening but understandable that so many people have given up. I had no clue how the War could be ended, and the underlying conflict be resolved before I first came to Jordan. Having lived here for almost two months I know even less. I understand why conversations on this topic always end in one sentence. إن شاء الله, if God wills it. Many people in Jordan have lost faith in the ability of Jordan and its neighbours to end this conflict. I am not religious, so to me turning to God is not a very convincing course of action. Yet, I do believe the chance of divine intervention resolving this conflict might be similar to the chance of people doing so. Frustratingly low.