page_title: Naharayim
section_title: 1949 armistice line
hierarchical_section_title: Naharayim / 1949 armistice line
caption_attribution_description: English: Portion of map annexed to 1949 Israel-Jordan armistice agreement. العربية: جزء من الخريطة ملحق باتفاقية الهدنة بين إسرائيل والأردن عام 1949.
context_page_description: Naharayim, historically the Jisr Majami area, where the Yarmouk River flows into the Jordan River, was named by the Palestine Electric Company in a letter dated 27 February, 1929 to Palestine Railways giving "proper names" to the "different quarters of our Jordan Works" one of these being the "works as a whole including the labour camp" to be called "Naharaim" and another being the site of the "Power House and the adjoining staff quarters, offices" to be called Tel Or. Most of the plant was situated in the Emirate of Transjordan and stretched from the northern canal near the Ashdot Ya'akov in Northern Mandatory Palestine to the Jisr el-Majami in the south.
  The area includes the disused "First Jordan Hydro-Electric Power House", constructed between 1927–33 in the area adjacent to the Roman bridge known as Jisr Majami. The plant, established by Pinhas Rutenberg, produced much of the energy consumed in Mandatory Palestine until the 1948 Palestine war. The channels and dams built for the power plant, together with the two rivers, formed a man-made island. The residential area is known today as Qaryet Jisr Al-Majame.
context_section_description: Although the 1949 Israel-Jordan armistice agreement did not explicitly mention this region, the map attached to the agreement showed the armistice line cutting off a corner of Jordan between the two rivers (the present day Island of Peace).  When Israel sent military forces into this corner in August 1950, Jordan filed a complaint with the United Nations Security Council. According to Jordan, the map had been improperly altered from the original agreed by the parties, was inadequately signed, and in any case the armistice agreement was never intended to alter the territory of Jordan. Israel responded that it was immaterial how the map came to be how it was, as only the final version was binding. The Security Council then questioned Ralph Bunche, who had been the UN mediator at the armistice negotiations at Rhodes. He said that the parties had brought map overlays to Rhodes from earlier informal negotiations and they were transferred manually onto a 1:250,000 map (shown right). He could not explain why a part of Jordan had been cut off and was sure it had not been brought up in the formal meetings. However, his opinion was that although the region remained sovereign Jordanian territory it was on the Israeli side of the armistice line because the map was an integral part of the agreement which both parties had signed.
caption: Armistice line as shown on the official map
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