2013 sees Jordan go from coddling Hamas to spurning it

In January, Jordan's king was publicly trying to mainstream Hamas to the world. At the World Economic Forum he claimed that Hamas was "more open than ever" to dialogue with Israel, and a few days afterwards he claimed that Hamas accepted a two-state solution.

Of course, Hamas immediately and vehemently denied both reports, but it shows that King Abdullah was trying to mainstream Hamas as it was being propped up by Egypt and actively supplanting the PA diplomatically.

Things are quite different today.

The chairman of Jordan's Foreign Affairs Committee in its parliament said that Jordan has no intention to normalize relations with Hamas, and that its political leader Khaled Meshal was unwelcome in the kingdom.

In January, moderate Arab states were afraid that Islamists would ride the Arab Spring wave and take over all of the Middle East, so acting in a conciliatory way seemed to be a wise move to stay alive politically. Now, after Egypt's popular coup, the Islamists are the ones running scared and being marginalized again - as they were in the 20th century.

Reverberations echo widely.

Too bad that same lesson is not being learned in the West as far as Shiite fundamentalism is concerned.