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Palestinian children in the Baqaa refugee camp north of Amman, 2001 (AFP/File/Jamal Nasrallah)
"Officials are denying entire families the ability to lead normal lives with the sense of security that most citizens of a country take for granted," the report said.
The practice continued in 2009, denying many people basic citizenship rights such as access to education and health care, HRW said.
"We believe the total and actual number of those who have been stripped of their nationality is much bigger," Christoph Wilcke, a HRW researcher, told reporters.
In 1950, Jordan annexed the West Bank following the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, and granted all residents Jordanian nationality.
But in 1988, it severed legal and administrative ties to the West Bank, "relinquishing claims to sovereignty there and withdrawing Jordanian nationality from all Palestinians who resided in the West Bank at the time," the report said.
"Other Jordanians of West Bank origin, but who were not living in the West Bank at the time, were not affected and kept their Jordanian nationality.
"Over the last decade and more, though, Jordan has arbitrarily withdrawn its nationality from thousands of these citizens of West Bank origin," the report said.
Jordan, where a significant proportion of the nearly six million inhabitants are of Palestinian origin, has said the measure was a means to counter any Israeli plans to transfer Palestinians of the West Bank to the kingdom, according to HRW.
"One day you're Jordanian, and the next you've been stripped of your rights as a citizen in your own country," Whitson said.
But government spokesman Nabil Sharif criticised the report, charging it was rife with "inaccuracies and wrong allegations," according to remarks carried by the official Petra news agency.
Sharif said Jordan only revoked citizenship from a certain group of people who hold dual Jordanian and Palestinian nationality.
This measure, he said, aimed to "sort out the situation" of such individuals in keeping with Jordan's decision in 1988 to disengage from the West Bank.
Jordan is thus encouraging Palestinians to stay in the Palestinian territories "and foil (Israeli) plans to Judaize the land and empty it of its inhabitants."
Meanwhile, a Jordanian woman who says she was targeted by the decision, Kawkab Dawood al-Kawassmi, interrupted the news conference to vent her despair, saying her entire family had lost their citizenship.
"We've been living in Jordan for 60 years. There are 30 members in our family and we have all been stripped of our passports," Kawassmi said.
"We no longer have health insurance, we are not allowed to own property and our children can no longer find work," she added, pleading with Jordan's King Abdullah II to look into her family's case.
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The practice continued in 2009, denying many people basic citizenship rights such as access to education and health care, HRW said.
"We believe the total and actual number of those who have been stripped of their nationality is much bigger," Christoph Wilcke, a HRW researcher, told reporters.
In 1950, Jordan annexed the West Bank following the 1948 Arab-Israeli war, and granted all residents Jordanian nationality.
But in 1988, it severed legal and administrative ties to the West Bank, "relinquishing claims to sovereignty there and withdrawing Jordanian nationality from all Palestinians who resided in the West Bank at the time," the report said.
"Other Jordanians of West Bank origin, but who were not living in the West Bank at the time, were not affected and kept their Jordanian nationality.
"Over the last decade and more, though, Jordan has arbitrarily withdrawn its nationality from thousands of these citizens of West Bank origin," the report said.
Jordan, where a significant proportion of the nearly six million inhabitants are of Palestinian origin, has said the measure was a means to counter any Israeli plans to transfer Palestinians of the West Bank to the kingdom, according to HRW.
"One day you're Jordanian, and the next you've been stripped of your rights as a citizen in your own country," Whitson said.
But government spokesman Nabil Sharif criticised the report, charging it was rife with "inaccuracies and wrong allegations," according to remarks carried by the official Petra news agency.
Sharif said Jordan only revoked citizenship from a certain group of people who hold dual Jordanian and Palestinian nationality.
This measure, he said, aimed to "sort out the situation" of such individuals in keeping with Jordan's decision in 1988 to disengage from the West Bank.
Jordan is thus encouraging Palestinians to stay in the Palestinian territories "and foil (Israeli) plans to Judaize the land and empty it of its inhabitants."
Meanwhile, a Jordanian woman who says she was targeted by the decision, Kawkab Dawood al-Kawassmi, interrupted the news conference to vent her despair, saying her entire family had lost their citizenship.
"We've been living in Jordan for 60 years. There are 30 members in our family and we have all been stripped of our passports," Kawassmi said.
"We no longer have health insurance, we are not allowed to own property and our children can no longer find work," she added, pleading with Jordan's King Abdullah II to look into her family's case.
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