The Jordanian Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party (JASBP), previously known as the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party – Jordan Region ( ar, حزب البعث العربي الاشتراكي الأردني ''Ḥizb Al-Ba'aṯ Al-'Arabī Al-Ištirākī al-’Urdunni'') is a
political party
A political party is an organization that coordinates candidates to compete in a particular country's elections. It is common for the members of a party to hold similar ideas about politics, and parties may promote specific political ideology ...
in
Jordan
Jordan ( ar, الأردن; tr. ' ), officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan,; tr. ' is a country in Western Asia. It is situated at the crossroads of Asia, Africa, and Europe, within the Levant region, on the East Bank of the Jordan Rive ...
. It is the Jordanian regional branch of the
Iraqi-led Ba'ath Party.
History
Following the establishment of the
Ba'ath Party
The Arab Socialist Baʿath Party ( ar, حزب البعث العربي الاشتراكي ' ) was a political party founded in Syria by Mishel ʿAflaq, Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn al-Bītār, and associates of Zaki al-ʾArsūzī. The party espoused B ...
in Syria in 1947,
Ba'athist ideas spread throughout the
Arab world
The Arab world ( ar, اَلْعَالَمُ الْعَرَبِيُّ '), formally the Arab homeland ( '), also known as the Arab nation ( '), the Arabsphere, or the Arab states, refers to a vast group of countries, mainly located in Western A ...
. In Jordan Ba'athist thought first spread to the
East Bank
Transjordan, the East Bank, or the Transjordanian Highlands ( ar, شرق الأردن), is the part of the Southern Levant east of the Jordan River, mostly contained in present-day Jordan.
The region, known as Transjordan, was controlled by nu ...
in the late-1940s, most notably at universities. While the regional branch was not formed before 1951, several meetings took place at the universities where students and professors alike would discuss the ideology of the newly established
Ba'ath Party
The Arab Socialist Baʿath Party ( ar, حزب البعث العربي الاشتراكي ' ) was a political party founded in Syria by Mishel ʿAflaq, Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn al-Bītār, and associates of Zaki al-ʾArsūzī. The party espoused B ...
. Several people expressed their support for Ba'athist ideology at these meetings, but the regional branch itself was not formed until 1951 in
Karak by a group of teachers. A clinic owned by Abd al-Rahman Shocair became a meeting place for Ba'athists in the organisation's early days. In the
West Bank
The West Bank ( ar, الضفة الغربية, translit=aḍ-Ḍiffah al-Ġarbiyyah; he, הגדה המערבית, translit=HaGadah HaMaʽaravit, also referred to by some Israelis as ) is a landlocked territory near the coast of the Mediter ...
the party was most active in the cities of
East Jerusalem
East Jerusalem (, ; , ) is the sector of Jerusalem that was held by Jordan during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, as opposed to the western sector of the city, West Jerusalem, which was held by Israel.
Jerusalem was envisaged as a separat ...
and
Ramallah
Ramallah ( , ; ar, رام الله, , God's Height) is a Palestinian city in the central West Bank that serves as the ''de facto'' administrative capital of the State of Palestine. It is situated on the Judaean Mountains, north of Jerusale ...
. Bahjat Abu Gharbiyah was the West Bank Ba'ath member, and, because of it, was responsible for building up the party organisation in this area.
The party's first regional conference was held in 1951 at
Abdullah Rimawi
Abdullah Rimawi ( ar, عبد الله الريماوي; also spelled ''Abdullah ar-Rimawi'', 1920 – 5 March 1980) was the head of the Ba'ath Party in Jordan in the 1950s. He served as Foreign Affairs Minister in Suleiman Nabulsi's government ...
's home. At this meeting the party's first ideological programme was laid out, and a plan which mapped out the "future course of the party". The following year, in 1952, another meeting was held, this time in Abdullah Na'was' home. At this conference a Regional Command was elected with Rimawi as its General Secretary, while Shugyar, Gharbiyah and Na'was were elected to the Central Committee. Rimawi and Na'was would prove to be effective leaders, and their recruitment campaign proved successful in both Jordanian and Palestinian neighbourhoods and cities.
The regional branch became a legalised party on 28 August 1956 by a decision of the Jordanian High Court.
Both Rimawi and Na'was were
elected to Parliament during the
1950 and
1951 elections as
independents (the Ba'ath Party was not a legalised party at this time).
The party managed to get three ba'athists elected to Parliament in the 1951 election. However, during the
1954 election they lost all their seats. Rimawi was re-elected in the
1956 election to the Jordanian parliament, and retained his seat until the
1961 election. As voting patterns would prove, the largest concentrations of ba'athists lived in
Irbid and
Amman
Amman (; ar, عَمَّان, ' ; Ammonite language, Ammonite: 𐤓𐤁𐤕 𐤏𐤌𐤍 ''Rabat ʻAmān'') is the capital and largest city of Jordan, and the country's economic, political, and cultural center. With a population of 4,061,150 a ...
on the East Bank, and Jerusalem and
Nablus
Nablus ( ; ar, نابلس, Nābulus ; he, שכם, Šəḵem, ISO 259-3: ; Samaritan Hebrew: , romanized: ; el, Νεάπολις, Νeápolis) is a Palestinian city in the West Bank, located approximately north of Jerusalem, with a populati ...
on the West Bank.
Shuqyar during his forced exile inside Jordan, was influenced by
communist thought during his exile. When his exile ended, Shuqyar tried to form a National Front with the
Jordanian Communist Party
The Jordanian Communist Party (JCP; ar, الحزب الشیوعی الاردنی, ''al-Hizb al-Shuyu'i al-Urduni'') is a communist party in Jordan, founded in 1948. Its current general secretary is Dr. Munir Hamarana. It publishes ''al-Jamahir ...
and the Ba'ath regional organisation as its leading members. However, his fellow ba'athist colleagues opposed this idea, and, because of it, Shuqyar left the party.
The party was again legally registered in 1993, but was forced to change its name to Jordanian Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party. From then on it has been led by
Akram al-Homsi
Akram al-Homsi ( ar, أكرم الحمصي) is the Regional Secretary of the Jordanian Regional Command of the Jordanian branch of the Ba'ath Party.
References
Living people
Members of the Jordanian Regional Branch of the Ba'ath Party
Yea ...
. Khalil Haddadeen, Jordan's former Minister of Information, was elected to Parliament during the
1993 and
1997 elections on a
pro-Iraqi and pro-
Saddam Hussein
Saddam Hussein ( ; ar, صدام حسين, Ṣaddām Ḥusayn; 28 April 1937 – 30 December 2006) was an Iraqi politician who served as the fifth president of Iraq from 16 July 1979 until 9 April 2003. A leading member of the revolution ...
stance.
At the time of the 1966 split, the party had an estimated 1,000 members. It was active in the
Arab Liberation Front
Arab Liberation Front ( ar, جبهة التحرير العربية ''Jabhet Al-Tahrir Al-'Arabiyah'') is a minor Palestinian political party, previously controlled by the Iraqi-led Ba'ath Party, formed in 1969 by Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr and then hea ...
(ALF). The ALF's first leader was Jordanian, Zaid Haydar.
Munif al-Razzaz
Munif al-Razzaz ( ar, منيف الرزاز; 19 December 1919 – 16 September 1984) was a Jordanian-Syrian physician and politician who was the second, and last, Secretary General of the National Command of the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party, havin ...
, who joined the party in 1966, eventually became an ALF leader.
From there, he climbed the party ladder and became a member of the National Command before he was placed under
house arrest
In justice and law, house arrest (also called home confinement, home detention, or, in modern times, electronic monitoring) is a measure by which a person is confined by the authorities to their residence. Travel is usually restricted, if all ...
by Iraqi authorities.
Shahir Abu Shahut became the first leader of the party after the 1966 split.
Recent history
Since the establishment of the authoritarian political systems in Iraq and Syria, the popularity of the Ba'ath Party has waned, but Ba'athist ideology remains popular.
The reason being that both the
Iraqi and the
Syrian-led Ba'ath parties have replaced ideology with blind allegiance to
Saddamist discourse or the
Assad regime
Syria ( ar, سُورِيَا or سُورِيَة, translit=Sūriyā), officially the Syrian Arab Republic ( ar, الجمهورية العربية السورية, al-Jumhūrīyah al-ʻArabīyah as-Sūrīyah), is a Western Asian country loc ...
.
A Jordanese academic, talking to the American embassy in Amman, Jordan, said "there are far more real Baathists outside the party than inside", noting that the present party is downplaying (and even replacing) ideological components to get more followers.
The party was able to gain some support in the 1990s, because of its status as a Ba'ath Party branch, it was able to help finance thousands of scholarships to Iraqi universities.
However, with the
2003 invasion of Iraq
The 2003 invasion of Iraq was a United States-led invasion of the Republic of Iraq and the first stage of the Iraq War. The invasion phase began on 19 March 2003 (air) and 20 March 2003 (ground) and lasted just over one month, including 26 ...
, the party was nearly forced into bankruptcy, and lost most of its followers when it failed to finance the return of students from Iraq.
The party was denied legal registration in 1992, but was legally registered the following. However, it was forced to change its name from the "Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party" to the "Jordanian Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party" ( ar, حزب البعث العربي الاشتراكي الاردني ''Hizb Al-Ba'ath Al-'Arabi Al-Ishtiraki Al-Urduniy''). Khalil Haddadeen, Jordan's former minister of information, was elected to Parliament during the
1993 and
1997 elections on a pro-Iraqi, Saddamist platform. Currently, the party has no members of parliament.
In its first regional congress since the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the Regional Command alleged it would publicize an alleged letter from Saddam Hussien.
However, the Jordanian press largely ignored the event.
Today, in contrast to Ba'athist ideology, both the pro-Iraq and pro-Syrian parties are considered largely irrelevant in the Jordanian political scene.
It is suffering from financial problems, and it is criticized by religious Jordanians for its
secularism
Secularism is the principle of seeking to conduct human affairs based on Secularity, secular, Naturalism (philosophy), naturalistic considerations.
Secularism is most commonly defined as the Separation of church and state, separation of relig ...
, while others are weary of its
Arab nationalist
Arab nationalism ( ar, القومية العربية, al-Qawmīya al-ʿArabīya) is a nationalist ideology that asserts the Arabs are a nation and promotes the unity of Arab people, celebrating the glories of Arab civilization, the language an ...
ideology.
In a 1995 poll 16.8 percent of Jordanians said they were aware that the party existed, making the it the third-best-known political party in Jordan (surpassing the
Arab Ba'ath Progressive Party, its pro-Syrian counterpart, by over 10 percent in the poll). In May 2003, it was estimated that the party had less than 200 members. According to a
WikiLeaks
WikiLeaks () is an international Nonprofit organization, non-profit organisation that published news leaks and classified media provided by anonymous Source (journalism), sources. Julian Assange, an Australian Internet activism, Internet acti ...
document dating back to 2007, the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party figure Ahmed Al Dmour was considered one of the biggest threats to
Islamic Action Front dominance on the political scene.
See also
*
Arab Ba'ath Progressive Party
*
List of political parties in Jordan
This article lists political parties in Jordan. Jordan has 34 different political parties, but apart from the oppositional Islamic Action Front and neutral Jordanian National Youth Party, none of them play a real role because of lack of organizat ...
References
External links
Facebook Page
{{Jordanian political parties
1951 establishments in Jordan
Arab nationalism in Jordan
Ba'athist parties
Jordan
Jordan ( ar, الأردن; tr. ' ), officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan,; tr. ' is a country in Western Asia. It is situated at the crossroads of Asia, Africa, and Europe, within the Levant region, on the East Bank of the Jordan Rive ...
Political parties established in 1951
Political parties in Jordan
Socialist parties in Jordan