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Young Jordanians facing an uncertain future By TERRY HOUSHOLDER
Two men in their 20s - one a Jordanian Christian and the other
a Palestinian Muslim - spoke candidly on a condition of anonymity.
They said their native land of Jordan offers them no future.
Even though they are employed, both in the tourism industry,
they want a better life for themselves and their families. Their
dream is to come to the United States. They have lost hard-earned
money paying for visa applications, which were turned down by
the American Embassy. (A visa is an endorsement on a passport
showing a person has been granted official entry into a country.) They say most men their age with a good education and various
labor skills have similar goals. But they, too, are blocked from
leaving by the Jordanian government which works with the American
Embassy to try to stem the ''brain drain.'' Mostly desert, Jordan is a nation of 4.3 million people, half
of whom are Palestinian refugees or displaced people. There are
about 150,000 Iraqis living in Jordan, many of whom are refugees.
In addition to the waves of refugees absorbed in the 1948
and 1967 Arab-Israeli wars, the 1991 Gulf War caused about 300,000
Palestinians from Kuwait, Iraq and other Gulf states to permanently
move to Jordan. After the Turkish defeat in World War I, the territory of
Jordan became part of the short-lived Syrian kingdom under the
rule of King Faisal I, who later was king of Iraq. Jordan (then called Transjordan) was put under the rule of
King Abdullah, Faisal's brother, in 1921. The country was established as a constitutional monarchy through
a treaty with the British in 1928. A second treaty with Britain
in 1946 created the Hashemite Kingdom of Transjordan (now Jordan). The monarch today is King Hussein Ibn Talal, a Muslim who
is the 42nd generation direct descendant of the Prophet Muhammad.
He has ruled since 1953. Hussein's grandfather, King Abdullah,
was assassinated before Hussein's eyes on July 20, 1951, outside
the Al-Aqsa mosque in Old Jerusalem by a Palestinian extremist
who feared that the king would make a separate peace with Israel. Hussein struggled with the assailant and was shot himself,
but a medal that had been pinned to Hussein's chest at his grandfather's
insistence stopped the bullet and saved his life. Hussein's father, who suffered from schizophrenia, abdicated
on Aug. 11, 1952, in favor of his son. However, constitutionally,
King Hussein couldn't take power until May 2, 1953, the day he
turned 18 years old, according to the Muslim calendar. King Hussein, who turned 63 last month, has survived several
coups and assassination attempts and endured as a stable political
force in the region. Battling cancer for years, he has been in the United States
since July, being treated at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn.,
for non-Hodgkins lymphoma. Although frail, he is improving and
expects to return to Jordan in January. King Hussein has 11 children, four with his fourth wife, Queen
Noor, an American whom he married in 1978. The regent who has been running the country in his absence
is his younger brother, Crown Prince Hassan. Hussein has been a liberal ruler and Hassan is considered
more Islamic, something that concerns the Christian and Palestinian
men I talked with. In the event of the king's death, they fear
economic and political instability and creeping Muslim fundamentalism. King Hussein's popularity, at least on the surface, is strong.
That was evident in our visit to Amman, a modern capital of 1
million people. The king's birthday was Nov. 14 and the celebration
was continuing into the following week. Nearly every window in
the main shopping district of the city contained pictures of
the king in various poses. Some photo tributes to the king in
the streets were several stories high. The king is highly respected in the United States and around
the world for being a force of moderation, and for playing an
important role in trying to negotiate a peaceful resolution to
the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Jordan's industry and foreign investments are growing, but
it remains a poor country. It has inadequate supplies of water
and other natural resources such as oil and coal. Its gross national product is one of the lowest in the Middle
East, although its currency, the dinar, is strong, and is more
convertible than most Arab currencies. Unemployment remains a major problem. It was 30 percent after
the Gulf War in 1990 and was only reduced to 16 percent in 1994
and remains above the double-digit level today. Major export products in Jordan are phosphates and fruits.
But tourism has become an important industry, boosted after the
Jordan-Israel Peace Treaty was signed on Oct. 26, 1994. (Jordanians
may not agree with American foreign policy - many sympathize
with Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein and resent the U.S. allowing
Israel to maintain weapons of mass destruction - but they love
American tourists.) The future for young Jordanians like the men I met remains a question mark. It's understandable why their government wants to prevent them from leaving. But it's also easy to sympathize with their plight and their hunger for a better life. |
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