I'm in Jordan, and things this started up out of nowhere. There have been failed attempts each and every Friday for 2.5 months now to start true protests/revolutions, but with no effect. Yesterday people started camping out on a square near a main road, and today shit hit the fan as pro-government supporters stormed the square and the gendarmerie hosed down protestors and unleashed crowd control to try to bring things to and end.
There's a confirmed death from last night as the pro-government supporters stoned the protesters, and unconfirmed reports of another death today. Confirmed reports of many in critical condition after today's stampede though.
At least based on the Wikipedia article on Jordan, it looks like it is one of the better Arab countries when it comes to things like freedom of expression, women's rights, religious tolerance, and so on. Sure, not up to what we expect in a Western country, but pretty good by regional standards.
That's probably going to make it hard to have a revolution, since a lot of people will be happy with things the way they are.
In May, the state security court banned news media from covering corruption allegations involving the Jordan Petroleum Refinery Company and several national figures.
This ruling coincided with what many described as a "government-backed media campaign" against news websites, whose criticism of government policies and increasing influence among Jordanians seemed to have become intolerable among thin-skinned, high-ranking officials.
The law makes it a punishable offense to post anything to a website, blog, chat, or otherwise publish via digital means anything that will "inspire lack of confidence" in Jordan, it's economy, or the King. It is so vaguely worded that people have been imprisoned on it from posting political activism to simply swearing at the King.
The thing about Jordan is that it's suffering from a combination of factors that make it seem like paradise. Western Media is heavily relied on to make that things are nice, the King is considered to be a "kindred soul who once acted on Star Trek" (when he was considered to be the black sheep prince and not even a remote candidate for the throne). Jordan is a very important strategic ally for the USA in the region, and only the second country Middle East nation to acknowledge Israel - perhaps even more important than Egypt because it plays host to a 60% Palestinian population.
In Jordan, the average monthly income is about 350 USD. Gas is $4.50 a gallon though, and anything other than traditional falafel (some sort of vegetable burger) or shawarmah (gyros) is much more expensive than in the States. Sales tax has been raised to 28% on any electronics or telecommunication, cars are taxed at 80%, income tax is at 16% and general sales tax another 16%. Does that change the public perception?
I would have thought their government would have been intelligent enough to go for a slow changes over lots of time and no killing protesters. I guess not. I wonder if the king will survive and/or throw the rest of the government under the buss in an attempt to survive?
I recently heard on Israeli news that he sacked most/all of the cabinet after the revolution in Egypt, but that it's almost an annual event in Jordan so it's not necessarily a direct result of the recent Arab spring of nations
There's a confirmed death from last night as the pro-government supporters stoned the protesters, and unconfirmed reports of another death today. Confirmed reports of many in critical condition after today's stampede though.