ABDULLAH IN DC

King Abdullah of Jordan (you know, the nicer one) is in Washington to meet with President Bush, looking to steer his rickety regime through the Scylla of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to the west and the Charybdis of the impending U.S. attack on Iraq. Not surprinsingly, his public words are aimed at calming his own restive Palestinian-majority population - advocating against an attack on Iraq, and for an Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank. What he actually believes is a completely different story. He is a Hashemite after all, and his family's diplomatic legacy is one of almost unparallelled slipperiness (or do we forget his father's embrace of Saddam in the run-up to the Gulf War). For all of Abdullah's flaws, however, he presides over the most enlightened and least despotic regime in the Arab world. The best thing we can do to improve the condition of the Arab world is maximize Abdullah's influence. To do so, we need to ignore the advice he is giving us in public - by toppling Saddam, and giving Israel free reign to defeat the Palestinian military offensive. And in private, we should tell him that America will be happy to see an Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank - as soon as Abdullah is ready to put in his own forces in their place. For us not to pay whatever price Abdullah will ask in return (foreign investment, proceeds from Iraqi oil) would be penny wise and pound foolish.