The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #99577   Message #1988052
Posted By: beardedbruce
06-Mar-07 - 08:31 AM
Thread Name: BS: A Palestinian State?
Subject: RE: BS: A Palestinian State?
"With the break-up of the Ottoman Empire at the end of World War I, the League of Nations created the French Mandate Syria and British Mandate Palestine. Approximately 80% of the British Mandate of Palestine was east of the Jordan river and was known as "Transjordan". In 1921, the British gave semi-autonomous control of Transjordan to the future Abdullah I of Jordan, from the Hashemite family, who had lost their civil war with the House of Saud for control of Mecca and Medina."

"In 1950, Transjordan annexed the West Bank, which had been under its control since the armistice that followed the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. The annexation was recognized only by Great Britain (de facto in the case of East Jerusalem)."

"and it participated in the June 1967 war against Israel along with Syria, Egypt, and Iraq. During the war, Jordan lost the West Bank and East Jerusalem to Israel (the western sector having been under Israeli control). In 1988, Jordan renounced all claims to the West Bank but retained an administrative role pending a final settlement, and its 1994 treaty with Israel allowed for a continuing Jordanian role in Muslim and Christian holy places in Jerusalem."

"Jordan has a law that states that any Palestinian may immigrate and obtain Jordanian citizenship, but must remit his/her Palestinian claim. It should also be noted that Palestinians are not allowed to purchase land unless they give up their Palestinian citizenship. This violence has also led to a rise of extremism in Jordan. In November 2005, King Abdullah called for a "war on extremism" in the wake of three suicide bombings in Amman."
"Jordan has a population of 5.8 million. Most of the Bedouin population descend from the Hejaz.[8] or tribal origins and account for around 40-45% of the population.[8] However, 50 to 55% of Jordan's population are from Palestinian origins, many of whom fled from Palestine to Transjordan and gained citizenship after the Arab-Israeli wars in 1948 and 1967.[9] The remaining 5% of the population come from different ethnic minorities such as Circassians, Chechens, Armenians (13th largest in the world) and Kurds. Many Jordanians are also of Turkish and East European descent, as many Jordanian expatriates who reside in East European countries marry there.

The number of Lebanese permanently settling in Jordan since the 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict has not been established, and is estimated to be very little.

Christians form approximately 6% of the population and have 9% of the seats in parliament. Most Christians belong to the Greek Orthodox church (called "Room Urthudux" in Arabic). The rest are Roman Catholics (called "Lateen"), Eastern Catholics (called "Room Katoleek" to distinguish them from "Western Catholics"), and various Protestant communities including Baptists. Christians in Jordan are of many nationalities, as evinced, for example, by the Catholic mass being celebrated in Arabic, English, French, Italian, Spanish, Tagalog and Sinhala, as well as in Iraqi dialects of Arabic.

Since the Iraq War,[citation needed] many Christians from Iraq have settled permanently or temporarily in Jordan."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jordan