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### Viewing cable 08AMMAN705, JORDANIAN IDENTITY POLITICS TRUMP GENDER CONCERNS

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Reference ID | Created | Released | Classification | Origin
--- | --- | --- | --- | ---
08AMMAN705 | 2008-03-05 09:09 | 2010-12-28 21:09 | CONFIDENTIAL | Embassy Amman

`

    VZCZCXYZ3251
    RR RUEHWEB

    DE RUEHAM #0705/01 0650937
    ZNY CCCCC ZZH
    R 050937Z MAR 08
    FM AMEMBASSY AMMAN
    TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 1966
    INFO RUEHXK/ARAB ISRAELI COLLECTIVE

` `

    C O N F I D E N T I A L AMMAN 000705

    SIPDIS

    SIPDIS

    DEPARTMENT FOR G/IWI AND NEA/ELA

    E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/13/2018
    TAGS: PGOV KWMN KPAL KDEM JO
    SUBJECT: JORDANIAN IDENTITY POLITICS TRUMP GENDER CONCERNS
    ON CITIZENSHIP LAW CHANGES

    REF: A. 02 AMMAN 6528
    ¶B. 03 AMMAN 5012
    ¶C. AMMAN 391

    Classified By: Charge d'Affaires Daniel Rubinstein
    for reasons 1.4 (b) and (d)

    ¶1. (C) Summary: The issue of who can and cannot transmit
    citizenship is an ongoing concern of many women in Jordan,
    and was revived in the public consciousness during recent
    parliamentary elections. Jordanian women married to
    non-Jordanian men do not transmit citizenship to their
    children. This creates a precarious situation, primarily for
    the children of Palestinian fathers, but also for the
    children of foreign laborers resident in Jordan. Women's
    rights activists have worked on this situation for years, to
    no avail. Even public statements by, and strong support for
    legislative action from, the Queen have fallen on deaf ears.
    Meanwhile, the number of families with a tenuous legal
    situation in Jordan is growing as the Palestinian-origin
    population intermingles with East Bankers. Lawmakers dismiss
    changes to the law as politically impossible, even as civil
    society professes its willingness to compromise. In the end,
    it is Jordanian identity politics, not gender concerns, that
    are at the heart of this debate. End Summary.

    The Battle Over Jordan's Citizenship Law
    ----------------------------------------

    ¶2. (SBU) During the parliamentary campaign season, Jordanian
    voters (especially women) started to resurrect an issue of
    specific importance to them - amending Jordan's citizenship
    law. The issue of citizenship transferral has long been an
    issue in Jordan, which is home to large communities of
    refugees (and their descendants) as well as foreign workers
    who have naturally integrated with their Jordanian hosts.
    For the past several years, civil society activists and some
    parliamentarians have called for a new law or amendments to
    the current statute that would allow Jordanian women to pass
    citizenship to their children.

    ¶3. (U) According to the citizenship law currently in force
    (which dates to 1954, with several amendments), non-Jordanian
    women who marry Jordanian men can naturalize as Jordanian
    citizens after living in the country for certain periods of
    time. Wives of Arab extraction or nationality can become
    Jordanian citizens after three years' residence, and those
    from other countries can obtain citizenship after five years.
    While naturalization is possible for the wives of
    Jordanians, there is no such naturalization statute for
    children. The current law automatically grants citizenship
    to children of Jordanian men, regardless of where they are
    born. Yet there is no statute whereby women can transmit
    Jordanian citizenship, either to their spouses or their
    children. Note: The one exception is illegitimate children
    born to Jordanian women or cases where the father is unknown.
    These children automatically receive Jordanian citizenship.
    End Note.

    ¶4. (SBU) This issue impacts Jordanians of Palestinian origin
    and migrant workers from other Arab states most acutely.
    Note: Between the two, these groups are estimated to
    constitute as much as eighty percent of Jordan's population.
    End Note. Due to the varying degrees of citizenship
    available in Jordan, it is often the case that Palestinian
    men of less than full citizenship (refugees from Gaza or
    "green card" holders from the West Bank, to be covered
    septel) along with long term non-citizen laborers from Egypt,
    marry "full citizen" Jordanian women, producing children who
    have no rights to Jordanian citizenship. Over time, this has
    resulted in a growing number of families with split legal
    status in Jordan, despite having been born in Jordan or
    having lived in the country for decades.

    ¶5. (C) Queen Rania (herself of Palestinian origin) raised
    hackles and eyebrows in 2002 when she declared support for a
    provisional law which would allow women to pass Jordanian
    citizenship to their children (Refs A and B). That statement
    was followed up by a brief spate of op-eds and civil society
    campaigns in support of the law's implementation. The law
    was enacted, yet the new right remained theoretical in
    practice, as it required approval by the Council of Ministers
    for individual cases rather than making citizenship
    transmittal automatic. Since the law's enactment, no cases
    have been referred to the Council of Ministers for approval.
    Contacts note with wry smirks that even the Queen's
    intervention was not enough to quell the backlash of Jordan's
    political establishment. Eva Abu Hawaleh, a human rights
    lawyer, says that since "the decision didn't come from inside
    the government," the security services effectively quashed

    the law's effect. Note: Provisional laws, enacted by the
    government in the absence of parliament, remain on the books
    until considered in a subsequent legislative term. Six years
    after its enactment, the parliament has yet to revisit the
    changes to the citizenship law. End Note.

    Growing Pressure for Change
    ---------------------------

    ¶6. (C) There is a growing realization among women's rights
    activists and female members of parliament that something has
    to be done. Rawa Sarrar, head of a women's center in the
    Baqa'a Palestinian refugee camp, says that changes in the
    personal status law are a primary political concern among the
    women she serves. Through the center, the female voters of
    Baqa'a camp raised the issue repeatedly during the campaign
    season, and continue to do so with women who were seated in
    parliament as a result of the quota. Sarrar hopes that
    political pressure from NGOs and female voters will lead to
    necessary changes in the law, but she realizes that it is an
    uphill political fight. "Hopefully, it will happen during
    this term," she says.

    ¶7. (C) "Families in Jordan suffer from many provisions in
    the law," says Senator Haifa Abu Ghazaleh, who also serves as
    the Secretary General of the National Council for Family
    Affairs. She cites the many foreign laborers from Egypt and
    elsewhere in the Arab world who have lived in Jordan for long
    periods of time and are married to Jordanian women, but whose
    children are not entitled to Jordanian citizenship. Like
    many of our contacts, Abu Ghazaleh theorizes that until the
    Palestinian question is solved in Jordan, changes to the
    citizenship law are basically impossible. "We are waiting
    for the Palestinian issue to be solved. It won't be solved.
    Nobody here wants it to be solved," she complains (Ref C).

    ¶8. (C) Asma Khader, Secretary General of the National
    Commission for Women (and a former government spokesperson),
    is less concerned about the Palestinian factor, and more
    concerned about the message being sent to Jordanian women
    about their role in society. "It's not just about politics,
    it's about patriarchy," she says. Khader posits that the
    lack of an egalitarian citizenship law shows that women are
    second class citizens in Jordan, regardless of their
    political class or national origin. Eva Abu Hawaleh
    disagrees - she asserts that "it's not gender politics. The
    assumption is that men from the West Bank would pour over the
    border to marry Jordanians."

    ¶9. (C) "This is an issue for all women's groups in Jordan,"
    Khader says. "We thought domestic violence would be the
    number one issue among women, but it isn't. Citizenship
    rights are the number one issue for women in Jordan." Yet
    the National Commission for Women is stuck between a rock and
    a hard place when it comes to lobbying for amendments to the
    citizenship law. According to Khader, it receives floods of
    petitions from Jordanian women asking for intervention with
    the authorities on their behalf. Yet there is very little
    that the commission can do, other than express concerns to
    the Ministry of Interior and lobby the King and parliament
    for changes to the law. Those efforts have had mixed results
    at best: "His Majesty is very interested (in changes to the
    law), but the Ministry of Interior is blind. They don't want
    to recognize this problem." Khader says that even studying
    the problem is politically impossible, as the government is
    unlikely to cooperate in counting the numbers of women who
    are impacted by the law's current provisions.

    Working the System
    ------------------

    ¶10. (C) When asked about the possibility of a new
    citizenship law which would clarify the situation, the
    responses of parliamentarians range from deeply pessimistic
    to bluntly dismissive. MP Reem Qassem, who was elected via
    the quota for women, calls the ability of Jordanian women to
    transmit citizenship to their children "a right," but
    acknowledges that the issue is highly politicized. She holds
    out little hope of action during the current session of
    parliament. "We can't do it now," says MP Nasser Al-Qaisi.
    He and other contacts talk about a worst case scenario in
    which hundreds of thousands of new Jordanians are created
    overnight - Jordanians who will require services and
    representation from an already stretched government. While
    recognizing that the issue is out there, Qaisi notes that it
    is either low or absent from the government's priority list.
    MP Fayez Al-Shawabkeh put forth the novel argument that with
    rising levels of government support to Jordanian families to
    offset rising prices, Jordan could not afford to take on
    additional citizens.

    ¶11. (U) On February 23, a group of women's rights activists
    and female parliamentarians met with Prime Minister Dahabi to
    express their support for changes in Jordan's citizenship
    law, among other issues. While the group was well-received,
    the outcome of the meeting failed to point to concrete
    actions in the near future. Commenting in the Jordan Times
    after the meeting, activist Amneh Zu'bi stated that, "every
    time we meet with a Prime Minister, we receive positive
    responses to our demands. But in reality, we do not sense
    any tangible changes." Activists and parliamentarians
    complained in the article that changes demanded by women are
    "locked in the government's drawers."

    ¶12. (C) Women's rights activists in Jordan assert that a
    brand new citizenship law may not, in fact, be necessary.
    Rather, they believe that the current law is permissive
    enough, but simply not applied - hence the calls by Queen
    Rania and others for broad implementation of "humanitarian
    provisions" in the existing law which allow the Council of
    Ministers to approve citizenship transmittal in individual
    cases. "They just have to implement the law and the
    constitution," says activist Fawzi Samhouri. He adds that,
    as a party to the International Covenant on Civil and
    Political Rights, Jordan has a responsibility to treat the
    sexes equally when it comes to citizenship rights. Even so,
    Samhouri acknowledges that "rights in Jordan are subject to
    the approval of ministers - they aren't automatic."

    ¶13. (C) Asma Khader is of the opinion that "Jordanians are
    Jordanians wherever they are born," and that the citizenship
    of children who should by all rights be Jordanian transcends
    identity politics. Yet she is pragmatic, and is willing to
    accept even a half solution if it leads to progress on the
    issue. Khader points to the three year residency
    requirements for wives of Jordanian men, and wonders if such
    a provision could be extended to children as well - thereby
    cementing their Jordanian identity. Many of our civil
    society contacts share her view that compromise is possible
    on the issue, as long as the root problem of divided families
    is addressed somehow.

    ¶14. (C) Contacts in civil society are working behind the
    scenes for either implementation of current statutes or a
    clarification of the law itself, but hold out little hope
    that change will happen soon. Fawzi Samhouri notes that even
    the female members of parliament have done a poor job of
    addressing the issue, and cannot be relied upon to take
    action: "Women parliamentarians alone can't be advocates of
    this kind of change. Civil society has to take that
    responsibility." Asma Khader and Eva Abu Hawaleh raise the
    issue constantly in meetings with the Ministry of Interior,
    and pressure the government for action in specific cases.
    Yet they cannot obtain results. "It's not a legal issue.
    It's a wasta ("influence peddling") issue. These women have
    no wasta," Abu Hawaleh admits.

    Comment
    -------

    ¶15. (C) Whether changes come through legal clarification or
    changes in implementation, this seems to be a case where even
    the royal family has difficulty in turning the ship of state
    in a favorable direction. While the issue is on its surface
    a gender concern, it is more fundamentally about identity
    politics in Jordan. The assumption that the majority of
    beneficiaries would be Palestinians prevents change from
    taking place. The security needs of the state (i.e., to
    prevent a takeover of the East Bank-dominated political and
    security establishment) are the trump card that thwarts even
    much-needed changes in the law or administrative practice.
    It matters little whether the threat is perceived or real;
    creating political will that can stand up to the demography
    argument is nearly impossible in Jordan - even for the King.
    In spite of the Queen's statements and direct lobbying by
    civil society to the monarch himself with subsequent talk of
    action, change remains elusive. Grassroots action aimed at
    the implementing authorities in the Interior Ministry is
    similarly unfruitful. The category of needed legal changes
    which touch on the Palestinian issue in Jordan is waiting for
    one thing, and one thing only: a solution to the
    Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
    RUBINSTEIN

`