The region’s entry into a phase of direct confrontation with Iran, as the central front among seven open fronts, suggests that this confrontation is tilting toward resolution, particularly given the scale of US military engagement. Such involvement is unlikely to conclude without producing a real and fundamental shift within Iran. 

 

Yet this development does not stop at Tehran. It opens the door to a subsequent phase in which fronts that were temporarily frozen will be pushed into a new trajectory of escalation, one that may not take the form of direct confrontation, but rather a comprehensive process of reordering, preparing these fronts either for closure or for redeployment within new strategic equations.

 

More precisely, this may mark the end of a phase in which fronts were used as temporary tools of pressure, and the beginning of a phase in which they are transformed into fixed political and security realities. This shift goes beyond the military dimension and reaches into the core of regional political arrangements.

 

Within this context, Israeli political visions intersect with security imperatives in ways that may lead to the redrawing of borders under the banner of “security guarantees,” carrying with them deep and long-term political consequences. The consolidation of a new geographic and security reality for Israel could constitute the primary key to change in the coming phase, rooted in an Israeli security doctrine that assumes the era of exploiting surrounding geography to act against Israel has ended, and that any return to it is neither acceptable nor feasible.

 

This understanding has already been translated into practice along the borders with Gaza, the West Bank, Lebanon and Syria. It cannot be ruled out that it will extend to unilateral measures along the Jordanian border, particularly in light of increasingly explicit, both direct and indirect, Israeli signals in this direction. The reshaping of geographic space is no longer a purely security matter; it has become a political tool for redefining lines of engagement and the very boundaries of the state.

 

The third phase of escalation, namely, the phase of managing the newly imposed reality, is the most delicate and sensitive for Jordan, given its direct implications. Central here is the West Bank, which over the past two years has been subject to systematic measures that have altered realities on the ground and laid the foundations for a new environment. This makes the repercussions for Jordan nearly inevitable, whether at the demographic, security, or even political level.

 

At the present stage, security threats dominate the landscape: southern Syria with its risks of security breakdown, Iraq and the possibility of its transformation into an additional arena of escalation, and ultimately the Jordanian interior itself, where targeting the domestic front remains the most serious threat as the regional confrontation enters its final stages and power dynamics are recalibrated.

 

Jordan faces a set of complex challenges at this juncture, foremost among them the escalation with Iran reaching this critical point, signalling an impending structural transformation in the region. Reaching the Iranian front effectively marks the end of the second phase of escalation and the transition to a third phase that can be described as the “closure of fronts,” but through the imposition of a new reality rather than through traditional settlements. This means that upcoming challenges will extend beyond immediate security risks to encompass how to deal with new political and security realities imposed on all actors.

 

In preparing for what lies ahead, Jordan may need to adopt a dual-track strategy: maintaining close and continuous monitoring of regional developments while simultaneously focusing in earnest on the domestic front. This requires government policies that project the state and its institutions as strong and decisive in managing internal developments, without sacrificing the political flexibility needed to address sources of public frustration.

 

It also calls for mitigating economic policies and a balanced governmental discourse, one that combines an elevated sense of national responsibility with a coherent narrative that reinforces national cohesion at a pivotal regional moment. Particularly as the post–October 7 reality is fundamentally different from what preceded it and change on the ground has become a reality that all will have to confront as a given, not as a choice.