Jordan, 1957 — military coup attempt
Event Summary
In mid-April 1957 the young King Hussein of Jordan faced what royalist accounts describe as an attempted coup centered on the Zarqa army barracks, the culmination of a bitter struggle between the palace and the pan Arab nationalist forces around Army Chief of Staff General Ali Abu Nuwar and the pro-Nasser government of Prime Minister Suleiman Nabulsi. After Hussein forced Nabulsi to resign on 10 April, rioting broke out on 13 April at Zarqa between royalist Bedouin units and Arabist units, with rumors flying that the 21-year-old king had been killed. Hussein drove to Zarqa himself, rallied the loyal Bedouin troops, and defused the confrontation, while a 3,000-man Syrian force that had begun moving south turned back.
Abu Nuwar and other Arabist officers resigned and fled to Syria. Hussein imposed martial law, dissolved political parties, and disbanded suspect units, curtailing Jordan's mid-1950s constitutional democracy; whether a genuine coup or a fabricated pretext, the outcome entrenched his personal rule.
Researched Details
Researched
Independent research, added record by record. Hover any label for what it means.
Sources
Editorial Note
Cross-Reference
Datasets agree. At least two of the three reference datasets we check against carry this event, and none of them disagrees about its date or its result.
Identifiers for finding this same event in the other datasets:
- Cline Center id
66304141957- Albrecht/Koehler/Schutz (CAM) id
CAM-663-1957-04-13
How the match is made is described in crossref-report.md.
Outcome and Target
Coup Atlas research identifies the target as: King Hussein survived the Zarqa affair unharmed and consolidated his personal rule; he reigned until his death in 1999.
Baseline coding: Coup attempt failed to remove the incumbent. Recorded leader fate: remained in office; not physically harmed. The baseline file does not name individual targets; researched names are kept in a separate layer.
Baseline Dataset Citation
Baseline Source-Document Entries
CSP
Powell and Thyne
New York Times
This is the citation trail carried by the baseline dataset, grouped by outlet and rejoined from the line-wrapped original. Coup Atlas has not independently re-checked every document; read the original before citing a specific claim. URLs the import damaged beyond safe repair are shown as plain text and listed in citations-report.md. How this list is built →