ABSTRACT
The external image of Jordan as a country portrays it as having an even larger Palestinian majority. One of the reasons for this discrepancy between the actual number and the general impression is the intensive political activity and militant ideological attitude of the camp-dwellers in Jordan. In 1980, the official number of refugees in Jordan was 716,000, a third of them residing in the camps. The camp-dwellers thus constitute one-tenth of the population, but their significance as a challenge to the Hashemite regime by far exceeds their relatively small numbers. The majority of the 1948 and 1967 refugees identify themselves as Palestinians and would clearly differentiate between themselves and the East Bankers. With the continued survival of the Hashemite regime, their Palestinian identity has became a complex, tangled self-image, which so far has led to political passivity. The Hashemite regime itself was quite undecided as to the degree to which it wanted to integrate the Palestinians in Jordan.
