Colonial law segregated Bedouins into a distinct tribal legal category

Evidence

On this too, see Massad’s Colonial Effects and its description of a similar process of distinction between civil law and tribal law in Jordan, a process that, between 1921 and 1976, established that “all Bedouins are ostensibly equal in the civil code but are constituted as different through the application of tribal law” (50). As a result of British pressure, the Bedouins were to be “governed by a new set of laws as early as October 1924, when the Mandatory-Hashemite state enacted the Law ofTribal Courts” (52, and see 56-66). Massad goes on to explore the links between this division and the distinction of the traditional versus the modern. He discusses the territorial confinement of the Bedouins and their role in historical fantasy, tourism, and law enforcement (the military and the police). — Gil Anidjar, The Jew, the Arab, 788

Categorization

• XREF: Massad’s civil/tribal law distinction in Jordan parallels the differential legal treatment that defines the Arab/Jew-as-enemy category elsewhere in the Islamophobia corpus.