NEED TO KNOW

Stuck in the Middle

JORDAN

The Jordanian government approved an electoral law two years ago, and amendments to it in February, that officials portrayed as a step forward in the kingdom’s slow but steady democratization.

The measure is intended to increase representation for women while lowering the minimum age for lawmakers from 30 to 25, for example. It is also designed to give birth to new political parties and coalitions that reflect the will of moderate Jordanians and temper Islamist tendencies in the population, the Arab News wrote.

Still, when voters go to the polls to elect a new lower house of parliament on Sept. 10, “it will be a moment of truth” for the kingdom’s reform policies, wrote Chatham House, a United Kingdom-based think tank.

The law’s defenders say that expanding the pool of potential elected officials might help the government address Jordan’s poor economy and the instability surrounding events in its neighborhood, namely the Palestinian West Bank and the Israelis who occupy it, Xinhua reported.

But the new system also retains much of the old one in ways that exhibit the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan’s complicated position today in the Middle East.

Jordanian electoral law, for instance, still favors the countryside and tribal provinces – where support for King Abdullah II is stronger compared with urban centers where liberals favor democratic reforms and Islamists related to the main opposition group, the Islamic Action Front (IAF). The latter is the ideological ally of Hamas, now fighting Israel in the Gaza Strip, Reuters explained.

Usually, parties loyal to the monarch win these elections handily. This year, however, the events in Gaza could change things. Many Jordanian voters are the descendants of those who fled their lands in Israel after a series of wars erupted following the founding of the Jewish state in 1948.

“The conflict is likely to have an outsized impact on this year’s election and popular domestic support for the Palestinian cause could help the IAF and other Islamist candidates in their electoral bids,” wrote Washington DC-based analytical group Freedom House.

Recently, for instance, Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi said that any Israeli plan to push Palestinians out of the West Bank into Jordanian territory would treated as a “declaration of war,” noted Middle East Monitor. Those comments came after Israeli forces launched major strikes in the West Bank, leaving dozens dead and much destruction in their way, as the Associated Press described.

The pressure between internal and external forces is one reason why US-friendly Jordan, which signed a peace deal with Israel in 1994, is not necessarily a beacon of stability in the region any longer, argued Lancaster University international relations professor Simon Mabon in the Conversation.

In recent weeks, regular demonstrations against the war in Gaza have escalated, with protestors now focusing on the Hashemite court and accusing the king of colluding with the Israelis.

As a result, “Jordan remains on the precipice,” wrote Mabon. “Bringing peace to Gaza is a necessary step in reducing tensions in the Hashemite kingdom, but it alone will probably be insufficient.”