Jordan's King Abdullah says Israelis and Palestinians paying price for violence

King Abdullah of Jordan said on Wednesday that violence is costing both Israelis and Palestinians, a day after the shooting of five Israelis near Tel Aviv, reportedly by a Palestinian.

A palace statement quoted the king as telling Israeli President Isaac Herzog that it was necessary to work for peace so that "the Palestinians and the Israelis do not continue to pay the price".

The king said that Jordan "condemns violence in all of its forms" and that "every life matters", in reference to the attack on Tuesday.

The shooting occurred in Bnei Brak, an ultra-Orthodox city near Tel Aviv. Israeli media said a Palestinian man killed five men in their 30s and 40s.

Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said the country was facing a wave of terrorism after six people were killed in two earlier attacks, which were claimed by supporters of ISIS.

The Israeli president was in Jordan on a rare, announced visit to Amman. King Abdullah regularly meets Israeli officials, without announcing the meetings.

The royal palace gave out a photo of the two men shaking hands in front of the Jordanian and Israeli flags.

Mr Herzog said came to Jordan as people in Israel were burying the victims of the attacks in his country.

"We must fight together against any type of terror and cooperate for the benefit of the security of our nations," he said during the meeting with the king.

Jordan since the election of US President Joe Biden in November 2020 has sought to raise its profile in the Middle East, in particular in relation to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

It is an issue where Jordanian officials regard the kingdom as having been sidelined during the Donald Trump presidency.

Relations between Israel and Jordan deteriorated during the 11-day war in May last year between Israel and Hamas, with Amman accusing the Israelis of unjustified repression of the Palestinians in the months leading to the war.

The king later in the year met senior Israeli officials and the two countries struck a barter agreement that would see Israel provide Jordan with water in return for electricity from a proposed solar power plant.

But Jordan was absent from a meeting in Negev, Israel, this week between senior ministers from the UAE, Israel, Bahrain, Morocco, Egypt and the US.

The focus of the meeting was building up deterrence against Iran.

A Jordanian official said on condition of anonymity that Jordan was invited but chose not to attend. He indicated that it was not in the kingdom's interest to attend the meeting, without elaborating.

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Are non-fungible tokens a currency, asset, or a licensing instrument? Arnab Das, global market strategist EMEA at Invesco, says they are mix of all of three.

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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.

Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.

“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.

Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.

“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.

Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.

From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.

Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.

BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.

Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.

Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.

“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.

Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.

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“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”

The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”

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Salman Khan’s father, Salim Khan, is one of Bollywood’s most legendary screenwriters. Through his partnership with co-writer Javed Akhtar, Salim is credited with having paved the path for the Indian film industry’s blockbuster format in the 1970s. Something his son now rules the roost of. More importantly, the Salim-Javed duo also created the persona of the “angry young man” for Bollywood megastar Amitabh Bachchan in the 1970s, reflecting the angst of the average Indian. In choosing to be the ordinary man’s “hero” as opposed to a thespian in new Bollywood, Salman Khan remains tightly linked to his father’s oeuvre. Thanks dad.