Jordan (al-mamlaka al-urdunniyya al-hashimiyya)

The year 1986 ushered in a new phase in relations between Jordan and the Palestine Liberation Organization and in Jordan's Palestinian policy. Jordan's objectives in regard to the Palestinians were made unmistakably clear — the ultimate incorporation of the Palestinians, in Jordan and the occupied territories, into a Jordanian-dominated political entity. The new Election Law was also a response to the steadily growing demands for the democratization of the Jordanian political system, but it introduced no significant change in the country's guided and controlled form of democracy. Parliamentary activity in 1986 followed what had become a regular pattern since the restoration of Parliament in 1984. Under the Government of Zayd al-Rifa'i numerous steps had been taken to reestablish government control over religious affairs and the election process, and very firm action had been taken against any form of opposition to the regime.