two years’ validity, issued on a general basis since the late 1980s20, continues to serve as the key document for ex-Gazans, entitling them to travel and to access public services in Jordan. Public services: education, health, and poverty support Education Ex-Gazans resident in Jordan have generally been able to access ten years of basic schooling, in either public schools or in UNRWA schools, and have been exempt from any fees normally paid by non-nationals. After completion of these ten years, however, choices are in practice more limited. Ex-Gazans may attend government vocational and technical programmes if DPA sends a letter requesting such on the student’s behalf 21. Ex-Gazans registered with UNRWA (those initially displaced to Gaza in 1948) may also enrol in UNRWA’s higher and further educational institutes (vocational training and community colleges) 22. Ex-Gazans who wish to continue into other higher education may enrol in public or private universities in Jordan. Jordanian students are initially allocated to places in public universities through a competitive ranking (tanafusi) system based on their grades in the Jordanian General Secondary Education Certificate Examination (tawjihi) 23. Students obtaining a place through this tanafusi system pay a highly subsidized rate for tuition. Jordanian students who do not obtain the highest grades — and thus do not get a tanafusi place on their chosen programme — may also apply to any remaining places through the ‘parallel’ (mouwazi) system, for which they pay somewhat higher fees. Ex-Gazans, as noncitizens, find themselves excluded from both of these systems of admission — with a few exceptions — regardless of their results in the tawjihi. This means that to study at a public university, they must pay the much higher fees charged to foreign students in US dollars. For example, to study mechanical engineering at the University of Jordan (the most prestigious public university) in the academic year 2017-18, a student with a national number who obtained a place through the competitive (tanafusi) system would have paid 41 USD (29 Jordanian dinars (JD)) 24 per credit hour, whereas an ex-Gazan graduating from a Jordanian high school but enrolled through the system for foreigners would pay 260 USD per credit hour, making the full cost of the degree approximately 42,120 USD for an ex-Gazan, compared to 6,619 USD for a Jordanian national (University of Jordan, 2018a, 2018b). A limited number of ex-Gaza students each year are able to partially circumvent these fees. Firstly, exceptions may be made at the level of individual public universities. Secondly, they may apply for a university place through the Royal Quota (makruma malakiyya), for residents of the 13 Palestinian refugee camps, or the Palestine Embassy quota. Recipients of quota places pay the subsidized tanafusi fees for their studies (although even these remain prohibitive for many ex-Gazans). The camp resident quota offers 350 seats Two-year temporary passports were also issued to Gazans coming from Kuwait in connection with the first Gulf war and who could not return to Gaza. In 2017, new rules state that ex-Gazans can apply for a five-year temporary passport upon their second renewal (website of the Prime Minister, Government of Jordan, 2017). 21 Interview with DPA, 18 February 2016; Jerash Camp Improvement Committee, October 2015, January 2016; focus group interviews Jerash Camp, January-February 2016. 22 UNRWA’s Faculty of Education, Science and Arts offers teacher training programmes certified as bachelor’s degrees (class teacher, Arabic, English and geography). 23 It is worth noting that around 40% of all students are admitted not under the general competitive system but under quotas reserved for various groups (Massadeh, 2012). 24 Foreign students are obliged to pay in US dollars. The Jordanian dinar is pegged to the US dollar at 1 USD = 0.708 JD. 20 Fafo Report 2019:34 20