Abdullah II of Jordan

Abdullah II bin Al-Hussein (Arabic: عبدالله الثاني بن الحسين, romanized: ʿAbd Allāh aṯ-ṯānī ibn al-Ḥusayn; born 30 January 1962) is King of Jordan, having ascended the throne on 7 February 1999. He is a member of the Hashemite dynasty, who have been the reigning royal family of Jordan since 1921, and is considered a 41st-generation direct descendant of the Islamic prophet Muhammad.Abdullah was born in Amman as the first child of King Hussein and his second wife, Princess Muna. As the king's eldest son, Abdullah was heir apparent until Hussein transferred the title to Abdullah's uncle Prince Hassan in 1965. Abdullah began his schooling in Amman, continuing his education abroad. He began his military career in 1980 as a training officer in the Jordanian Armed Forces, later assuming command of the country's Special Forces in 1994, eventually becoming a major general in 1998. In 1993, Abdullah married Rania Al-Yassin, with whom he has four children: Crown Prince Hussein, Princess Iman, Princess Salma and Prince Hashem. A few weeks before his death in 1999, King Hussein named Abdullah his heir, and Abdullah succeeded his father.

Abdullah, a constitutional monarch with wide executive and legislative powers, liberalized the economy when he assumed the throne, and his reforms led to an economic boom which continued until 2008. During the following years Jordan's economy experienced hardship as it dealt with the effects of the Great Recession and spillover from the Arab Spring, including a cut in its petroleum supply and the collapse of trade with neighboring countries. In 2011, large-scale protests demanding reform erupted in the Arab world. Many of the protests led to civil wars in other countries, but Abdullah responded quickly to domestic unrest by replacing the government and introducing reforms to the constitution and laws governing public freedoms and elections. Proportional representation was introduced to the Jordanian parliament in the 2016 general election, a move which he said would eventually lead to establishing parliamentary governments. Government critics remained skeptical, criticizing the reforms as resembling cosmetic changes. They took place amid unprecedented challenges stemming from regional instability, including an influx of 1.4 million Syrian refugees into the natural resources-lacking country and the emergence of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).

Abdullah is popular locally and internationally for maintaining Jordanian stability, and is known for promoting interfaith dialogue and a moderate understanding of Islam. The longest-serving current Arab leader, he was regarded by the Royal Islamic Strategic Studies Centre as the most influential Muslim in the world in 2016 and ranked fifth in 2022 and 2023. Abdullah is custodian of the Muslim and Christian sacred sites in Jerusalem, a position held by his dynasty since 1924. The 2021 Pandora Papers leak and the 2022 Credit Suisse leak revealed that Abdullah maintained a vast empire of wealth that he disguised through offshore companies and tax havens; the Royal Court responded that the offshore accounts were used for offering privacy and security, while the funds were a result of private wealth inherited from his father.