A00173 - Asma Khader, Jordanian Politician and Women's Rights Activist

 Khader, Asma 

Asma Khader (b. January 25, 1952, Zababida, West Bank under Jordanian rule – d. December 20, 2021, Amman, Jordan) was a Jordanian politician and women's rights activist. She served as Jordan's Minister of Culture from 2004 to 2005 and was a member of the Senate from 2014 to 2015. Khader died from pancreatic cancer on December 20, 2021, at the age of 69 in Amman.

Asma Hanna Khader was born on January 25, 1952, in Zababida, a town in the West Bank, which at the time was under Jordanian rule. Her father, Hanna, was a translator for the Jordanian Armed Forces. Her mother, Martha, owned a clothing shop in Amman. Asma attended school in the city and worked in her mother’s store.

Khader earned her undergraduate law degree from the University of Damascus in 1977. She established her own legal office in 1984 and was one of Jordan’s few practicing female lawyers.

In Jordan, Khader experienced life under martial law, imposed by King Hussein after the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. The law banned political parties and large public meetings, and gave the government broad powers to restrict freedom of speech and the press and to try ordinary criminal cases in military courts.

Khader joined the male-dominated opposition movement, becoming a vocal political activist despite the risk of detention. She also represented political prisoners.

She established the Solidarity is Global Institute in Jordan in 1998 to provide women with legal services and educational programs, and to lead campaigns for legislative and policy reforms. She served as the institute’s executive director until her recent illness.

Khader, along with other female activists, organized support, did research and lobbied lawmakers in an attempt to protect human rights in Jordan by revising the country’s penal code. That work led to the repeal of a law that had allowed rapists to avoid punishment by marrying their victims. In later years, Khader's Solidarity Is Global advocated the suspension of capital punishment in Jordan.

Khader married Adel Daibes, a lawyer, in 1977. They had four children, Osama, Ruba, Hanan and Farah.