Last Friday, a crowd of men set off from the local mosque in the small southwestern city of Tafilah to deliver a gift to the chief of the secret police at his office on the other side of town.
“It's a woman's dress,” explained Majdi al-Qabalin with a twinkle in his eye, “because he's a coward.” Along the way, they called out chants addressing King Abdullah II: “You saw what happened to Mubarak, Qaddafi and Ben Ali,” they cried. “No to Abdullah, no to Hussein!”