Human Rights in Jordan

 Hello Readers, welcome back to the Middle East and North African Human Rights blog. This week we will be discussing the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. 

Jordan has an ancient history, as the country has been part of many different empires throughout history. In the past century it was part of the Ottoman Empire, then after World War 1, it became a protectorate of the British Empire, known as Transjordan. In 1946, the country gained Independence from the British. Shortly after Jordanian independence, its neighbor, Mandatory Palestine was beginning to become the largest battleground in the Middle East with the Arab-Israeli War. Jordan was one of the nations which voted against partition of Mandatory Palestine into two separate nations, one Israeli and one Palestinian. During the Arab-Israeli War in 1948, Jordan joined the Arab League to fight against the implementation of an Israeli state. After Israel's victory and independence, Jordan took control of the West Bank territory and took tens of thousands of displaced Palestinians into the country as refugees (Jordan Profile). However during the 1967 Six Day War, Jordan lost control of the West Bank (including Jerusalem) to Israel along with Egypt losing the Gaza Strip and the Sinai Peninsula and Syria losing the Golan Heights region (Jordan Profile). This caused Palestinian militants such as the Palestinian Liberation Organization led by Yasser Arafat to relocate to Jordan due their headquarters being taken by Israel. After the PLO relocated to Jordan, they began to fight Israel from within Jordan’s territory and eventually began to call for an overthrow of the monarchy. During this conflict known as “Black September” the PLO was eventually expelled and moved to Lebanon in 1971. Later in 1988, Jordan relinquished its claim to the West bank and participated in peace negotiations which led to Jordan normalizing relations with Israel and was part of the broader Palestinian-Israeli peace process in 1994 which led to limited Palestinian governance in the West Bank and Gaza (Jordan Profile). In the 21st century, Jordan experienced terrorist attacks and as a result developed closer economic ties and military cooperation with the United States. Jordan experienced terrorist attack from ISIS and participated in the fight against ISIS in Syria. Jordan also took in hundreds of thousands of refugees from neighboring countries fleeing from conflict (Jordan Profile). In regard to Human Rights, Jordan has better Human rights than neighboring countries, especially in the Gulf region but still faces challenges. Freedom of Expression is suppressed especially in terms of criticism of the Monarchy , government officials, and religion even though it is a guaranteed right (World Report 2022). This leads to a muzzled press which cannot cover events such as corruption scandals regarding the royal family. Among the many refugees in Jordan, abuses have been reported such as not providing refugees with documentation and unjust deportations. Refugees also have trouble and are denied access to education, work, and health services and often live in poverty. An example of the conditions that refugees face in Jordan is that only a quarter of Syrian Refugee children in Jordan were enrolled in school (World Report 2022). Refugees continue to face food insecurity, troubles with documentation, and risk of deportation. Although Women’s rights and participation in society are stronger in Jordan compared to some of their neighbors, there are still issues which undermine the rights of women and sexual minorities. Some of these discriminatory practices include the permission of a male guardian to get married for the first time, marriages between non-Muslim men and Muslim women not being recognized, and not being able to travel outside of the country with their children without permission from the father (World Report 2022). Other discriminatory practices include authorities siding with men in situations of domestic violence and lower sentences for men who kill or harm their wives. In regards to LGBTQ+ rights, same sex relations are not illegal but “immorality” provisions exists which target sexual minorities and HIV positive people face medical and societal discrimination and deportation if they are foreign nationals (World Report 2022). Recently, Jordan has experienced a growing unemployment rate at 25% and people in Jordan face imprisonment for failure to repay debts that they hold along with travel bans (Jordan Archives). The Justice Minister and Prime Minister declared an end to the practice of imprisonment but the law has not been enacted and is set to expire which will affect 158,000 Jordanians (Jordan: End Debt). Jordan has been at the center of many major political developments in the middle east for the past century. This has included the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the fight against terrorism, and refugees that come from these events. Jordan has often been a better example for human rights compared to countries such as Saudi Arabia which is seen as a pariah in terms of human rights. Despite the country's advantages, Jordan must ensure the protection of all people in the country and work to improve women's rights, refugee rights and improve their conditions, worker rights, LGBTQ+ rights and guarantee freedom of expression and assembly along with expanding democratic practices (such as limiting the King’s involvement in government) to create a free, fair, and equal country.

Citations:

“Jordan: End Debt Imprisonment.” Human Rights Watch, 9 May 2022, https://www.hrw.org/news/2022/05/08/jordan-end-debt-imprisonment. 

“Jordan Archives.” Amnesty International, https://www.amnesty.org/en/location/middle-east-and-north-africa/jordan/report-jordan/. 

“World Report 2022: Rights Trends in Jordan.” Human Rights Watch, 13 Jan. 2022, https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2022/country-chapters/jordan. 

“Jordan Profile - Timeline.” BBC News, BBC, 5 June 2018, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-14636713.