For Jordan, U.S. Alliance Is a Shield That Keeps Drawing Iranian Fire
Jordan has long been one of Washington’s closest partners in the Middle East, but that alliance has rarely come with this price tag. Hundreds of Iranian drones and missiles have been aimed at the Hashemite Kingdom in recent months, mostly at or near installations used by U.S. forces. The strikes have not only tested American air defenses; they have tested a partnership that Amman has treated as essential to its survival.
At the same time, Jordan is absorbing pressure that would exist even without the Iranian threat. The economy is still buckling under the weight of millions of refugees from regional conflicts. Energy prices and inflation have squeezed ordinary households, while the tourism sector has struggled to draw visitors to the country’s cinematic landscapes. Across the border in the West Bank, Israeli settler attacks on Palestinians are deepening Jordanian fears that fresh instability could send waves of people fleeing into the kingdom.
Publicly, at least, the calculations in Amman have not changed. Jordanian officials say the U.S. alliance offers critical protection at a time when Iran is trying to expand its influence across the region. Sean Yom, a Temple University professor and author of Jordan: Politics in an Accidental Crucible, said Jordanian elites view Iran’s support for Shiite militias in Iraq, armed Palestinian factions and Syria-based drug traffickers as a direct challenge to the Hashemite court. “Very few people in Jordan think the Islamic Republic is good for the Middle East,” he said.
King Abdullah II has built his leadership around that partnership. Since taking the throne from his father in 1999, he has worked to make Jordan an indispensable American partner and has maintained unusually warm ties with both U.S. political parties. President Donald Trump once described him as “one of the true great leaders of the world.” President Joe Biden also praised his leadership, and first lady Jill Biden was among the guests at the wedding of Abdullah’s son in 2023. Pope Leo received the king at the Vatican in 2025.
The strategic ties go beyond diplomacy. Jordan provided logistical support and intelligence for the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 and contributed to the campaign against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. A 2021 defense agreement gave U.S. forces and contractors access to a dozen Jordanian military installations. In 2025, NATO opened its first regional liaison office in the kingdom.
Those installations have taken on added significance as Washington and Tehran face off. David Schenker, a fellow at the Washington Institute, said Jordan’s Muwaffaq Salti Air Base became a key logistics hub in the run-up to the Iran war, supporting U.S. C-17 transport planes and about 60 combat aircraft. “Jordan provides great strategic depth,” he said. “This makes Jordan a target, not just targeting U.S. forces but also targeting the king.”
About 50,000 U.S. troops are currently deployed across the Middle East, with an unknown number in Jordan. Schenker estimates that at least 8 percent of the kingdom’s annual budget, or $1.47 billion, comes directly from U.S. grants. The military relationship has also been restructured: Adm. Charles Bradford, the Pentagon commander for the Middle East, said in May that the United States had moved personnel and equipment from the anti-Islamic State mission in Iraq to Jordan as part of a broader strategy to keep American forces farther from Iranian missiles.
Those troops and aircraft have helped draw fire. Iranian barrages have hit near U.S. positions, and most incoming missiles and drones have been intercepted by American air defenses. But the attacks also raise the political cost of the U.S. presence. Every fresh strike reminds Jordanians that their country’s alliance with Washington is also a target in a wider war they say they never asked to join.
On Thursday in Vienna, Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi rejected the suggestion that Jordan had brought the attacks on itself. “Iran has been attacking us and many other countries in the region long before even this war started,” he said, citing Iranian meddling in internal affairs and other clandestine efforts. “So we do not buy their argument. We are a sovereign country. We were not a party to this war.”
For now, leaders in Amman appear willing to absorb the risk. The United States remains their strongest option in a dangerous neighborhood, and the alliance is unlikely to crack quickly. But with each round of strikes, the bill for that partnership grows — and the question of how long Jordan can afford it is no longer purely theoretical.