Meghan smiling at the bedside of a 14-year-old burns victim looks remarkably like the sort of royal visit for which Princess Diana was widely famed. The Duchess of Sussex clasps the hand of Maria during a visit to the Speciality Hospital in Amman after hearing how the girl was left traumatised when her parents and four other family members were killed in an explosion in Gaza. Prince Harry looks pained as the girl’s blanket is removed to show them, with her permission, the dressings on her badly damaged foot.
The Sussexes had arrived that day for a two-day trip that had all the hallmarks of an official royal visit. In keeping with their declared intention to “show up, do good”, Harry and Meghan visited a refugee camp and toured a youth centre run by Questscope, a social development organisation.
As the royal family reel from the fallout of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor’s arrest, with the King and Prince William speaking of their “concern” over his conduct, Harry has separated himself from the scandal by declining to comment on his uncle’s disgrace. Amid the noise at home, the Sussexes, for a change, look less complicated and more wholesome as a result.
To help to shine a light on worthy causes in the region, the Sussexes had given early warning to a reporter from the Press Association, a news agency that disseminates stories and pictures around the globe, to join them.
Harry and Meghan’s worldwide fame, however, did not always strike a chord with child refugees who have bigger things to worry about. When they joined a group of young girls in an outdoor football class, one came up to the duchess, who crouched down to speak to her through an interpreter, asking her age and being told she was seven years old.
A member of the Questscope staff said to the little girl, “You know Meghan?” but she promptly walked off. The duchess said with a smile: “So sweet, so confident — that’s what you’re instilling.”
In a Sussex take on the tried-and-tested Kate and William royal engagement sports formula — where the royals prove to be deeply competitive while still endearingly in love — Meghan and Harry had a go at football. Meghan won.
• Harry and Meghan start Jordan trip with kickabout in refugee camp
At a visit to the Za’atari refugee camp near Mafraq
AARON CHOWN/PA WIRE
But there is, of course, a serious side to the visit. Jordan has received Palestinian refugees, who now number about 2.5 million, and Syrians who fled conflict in their country, until recently ruled by Bashar al-Assad. The latest wave of displaced people came after Israel’s war against Hamas, which was sparked by Hamas atrocities against Israeli civilians during the attacks on October 7, 2023. Harry and Meghan have been clear not to endorse either side of the Gaza conflict and have focused instead on the human cost.
So why visit the Middle East now, so soon after Prince William returned from Saudi Arabia? We learnt in December that “after five beautiful years” the couple’s Archewell Foundation had become Archewell Philanthropies. Their visit comes at the invitation of Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director-general of the World Health Organisation, after the announcement of a $500,000 donation from the Sussexes last year. The money, recently paid out, has been put towards several projects, including the WHO, to help to develop prosthetic limbs and provide other support for children from Gaza and Ukraine.
Philip Hall, UK ambassador to Jordan, thanked the Sussexes for travelling to the Middle East, telling them: “Your visit, your support, your appreciation of the efforts that the United Nations, including of course the World Health Organisation, the government of Jordan and others are making here is enormously appreciated. So thank you for coming.”
Yet the Sussexes’ globetrotting has not inspired thanks from Palace insiders, who find it irksome, to say the least. In 2024 the couple carried out pseudo-official tours to Colombia and Nigeria. Harry has offered to let Buckingham Palace know before he rocks up on foreign engagements, but a courtesy email and asking whether a trip might be appropriate are two very different things (as the row over naming their daughter Lilibet, his grandmother’s nickname, proved).
• Happy birthday, With Love, Meghan! Here’s to… no more episodes
At the Za’atari refugee camp
AARON CHOWN/PA WIRE
It doesn’t help that, for years, the Windsors have fostered strong relationships with the Jordanian royals. Sitting in their civvies in a plush cinema room described at the time as “the ultimate man cave”, Prince William and Crown Prince Hussein watched England beat Panama 6-1 in the World Cup during William’s visit to Jordan in 2018. It’s a friendship that both men have continued to cultivate, with the Prince and Princess of Wales welcoming the Crown Prince and Princess of Jordan at Windsor Castle as recently as October.
Kate also has a personal connection to the country, having lived in Jordan as a child from 1984 to 1986 when her father, Michael Middleton, was posted to Amman during his work for British Airways. Kate and William returned with their three children in 2021 for a family holiday, choosing a picture from the trip to adorn that year’s Christmas card.
The King, too, has a close relationship with the Jordanian royal family. I was in Jordan with the King and Queen, then the Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall, in November 2021 when they visited the Hashemite Kingdom.
Kicking off the visit on his 73rd birthday, Charles kept a rather different schedule to that of Harry and Meghan. Fascinated by the country’s culture and history, he visited Juwafat al-Kafrayn, the place of Jesus Christ’s baptism, and Umm Qais, Irbid, the archaeological site of Roman ruins.
• Will Meghan return to the UK? Prince Harry has high hopes
It is not known if the King offered any advice to Harry before his visit to Jordan. Charles last saw his younger son five months ago in London, when he had tea with Harry in a meeting that lasted less than an hour.
Harry will return to the UK this year to mark the “one year to go” milestone before his Invictus Games competition is held in Birmingham in 2027. At the moment any chance of him bringing his two children, Archie, six, and Lilibet, four, seems vanishingly small as Harry continues to argue his family are not safe in the UK without police protection.
While Harry and Meghan were invoking the bedside manner of his mother in the Middle East, the centrepiece of a £3 million revamp of the Diana, Princess of Wales Memorial Playground was being lowered into place at Kensington Gardens. The children’s paradise features a 17-metre-long ship, a tunnel slide, a new treehouse and a redesigned water play area.
Given that Harry’s two children have not been to the UK since June 2022, however, they are unlikely to see it anytime soon.