Violent protests broke out across Jordan on Tuesday night after the government announced an increase in fuel prices.

Violent protests broke out across Jordan on Tuesday night after the government announced an increase in fuel prices, inciting what appeared to be an unparalleled show of anger directed at the king after months of mounting tension in the strategically important and politically fragile kingdom.

Demonstrators burned tires, smashed traffic lights and blocked roads in several Jordanian cities. Riot police officers tried to quell some of the crowds with tear gas. There were calls for a general strike on Wednesday.

In Dhiban, a city of 15,000 south of the capital, Amman, protesters burned pictures of King Abdullah II, witnesses said. In Salt, which has been a site of popular discontent, protesters destroyed two cars outside the prime minister’s home, which was empty. And in Amman, thousands of demonstrators filled the circle outside the Interior Ministry near midnight, chanting, “The people want the fall of the regime,” echoing similar chants in Egypt and Tunisia, where the Arab Spring began.

“The anger and frustration from the people is at its peak all over the kingship,” Murad Adailah, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood’s political wing, Islamic Action Front, said from outside the Interior Ministry. “This is unprecedented. The level of the slogans is the highest. This is the highest peak of tension that I’ve seen since the beginning of the Arab Spring.”

The eruption comes as King Abdullah has struggled to contain a growing and increasingly diverse opposition by introducing electoral reforms ahead of balloting scheduled for January and by establishing a constitutional court.

Critics have rejected these initiatives as half steps — they complain that the court, for example, is neutered because the king appoints its judges — and the monarchy has jailed dozens of activists on charges including incitement to change the Constitution and to overthrow the government, which can carry the death penalty. In October, the king dissolved Parliament and appointed Jordan’s fourth prime minister in a year.