Nationality and Cases of Statelessness in the Middle East and North Africa foregoing discussion of the conditions for acquisition and loss of nationality in MENA countries, several examples of provisions that directly discriminate or have the potential to lead to discrimination have already been pointed out. When drawn together, in the MENA, there are four particularly problematic areas of policy, which have a varying prevalence across the region: gendered nationality rules; ethnic criteria for access to nationality; religion-based prerequisites for access to or a grounds for loss of nationality; and conditions relating to mental and physical health that may operate to discriminate against persons with disabilities. By far the most common form of discrimination present in MENA states’ nationality laws is that on the ground of gender. In almost every country in the region, nationality policy is biased in favour of men, bestowing on them greater privileges with regards to the retention and transmission of nationality than women enjoy. Only Algeria places men and women on an entirely equal footing in its nationality law. Elsewhere, as shown above, there is wide-spread gender discrimination in the conferral of nationality jus sanguinis: in the majority of MENA countries, a child is still only entitled to inherit nationality from his or her mother in certain exceptional circumstances, whereas nationality can always be passed from father to child. Even more common are gendered 130