This analysis was written as part of a Special Report on the repercussions of war across six polities from October 7th, 2023-December 2025
Jordan has not reported destruction and direct economic losses either immediately after the attack of October 7, 2023, or in the two years after. However, the Hashemite’ Kingdom’s economic structure and geopolitical position rendered it exposed to the war between Israel and Hamas. Jordan had a diplomatic and humanitarian role in the conflict, including airdropping aid and keeping a field hospital in Gaza. From the beginning of this war, Amman has consistently opposed any plan to move Palestinians from Gaza or the West Bank into its territory and has withdrawn its ambassador from Israel in protest of the military action. Although being its neighboring country, the government stated that no Palestinian refugees entered its territory as a result of the conflict apart from those admitted for medical treatment.
The war has had a significant impact on Jordan’s society and caused losses to the economy despite the country’s lack of military involvement. These effects include trade disruptions caused by Red Sea instability, temporary drops in tourism from 2023 through 2025, unquantified consumer market shocks from boycotts—countered in part by increased consumption of locally manufactured goods, uncertainty, and both financial and diplomatic pressure from its reliance on outside funding particularly from the United States (though the 2025 dismantling of the United States Agency for International Development caused multi-sector shocks across the country—which had been the third-largest recipient of USAID from 2021-2025) and European Union. The conflict’s reported human cost of over 67,000, mostly civilian deaths and 169,000 injuries on the Palestinian as of late 2025, has deeply influenced Jordanian public opinion and political dynamics, resulting in protests and demands to stop any cooperation agreements with Israel.
Macro-impacts and aerial disruptions
Before the onset of the Gaza conflict, Jordan was still recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic. According to International Monetary Fund (IMF) data, real Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth, which had been negative at -1.1 percent already in 2019, recovered to 3.1 percent in 2023, a new peak since 2010. This was due to tourism sector expansion, gradual development in external demand, and fiscal consolidation that supported inflation stabilization and regained investor trust. However, this trajectory was disrupted in October 2023 when the Gaza war broke out and instability began to spill over into neighboring countries. The IMF reported that in 2024, Jordan’s real GDP growth slowed to 2.5 percent.
The economic spillover was first felt in the tourism sector, one of Jordan’s primary sources of foreign currency. According to the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities, by the end of the first quarter in 2024, visitor numbers had dropped by 3.9 percent and tourism receipts had fallen by 2.3 percent compared to the year before. This decline was associated with North American and European travelers’ security concerns and broader regional disruption in mobility affecting schedules of airlines and cruise ships. Airspace closures April and October of 2024 as well as June 2025, taken as a precaution amid Israel-Iran missile exchanges, added further uncertainty and temporarily disrupted connectivity.
Additionally, it must be assumed that some direct military costs incurred for the government in Amman, although there is no specific data on the cost of national air‑defense systems intercepting Iranian drones in Jordanian airspace.
Looking ahead, the IMF’s 2025 World Economic Outlook projects a 2.6 percent real GDP growth in Jordan by 2025, assuming no further escalation of the war and stabilization of external trade. Any disruptions in Red Sea shipping or any new political tensions could, however, easily drag growth below projections. Other than risks for trade and tourism as key sectors in the Jordanian economy, the nation’s economic structure and its reliance on foreign aid—particularly to organizations that support Palestine but are based in Jordan such as the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine (UNWRA)—increase its vulnerability to resurgence of regional conflicts, which at time of this analysis cannot be excluded, and to geopolitical developments in general.
Beyond costs incurred due to nearby conflicts and regional uncertainty, there is also a considerable domestic cost associated with Jordan’s diplomatic stance that incurred popular wrath. The Gaza conflict and the Israeli actions in the enclave in the past two years resulted in large nightly protests in Amman and other major cities, reflecting a rise in public opposition to any form of cooperation with Israel.
At the same time as being faced with irate voices in its populace, the government in Amman managed a difficult diplomatic dance of avoiding diplomatic confrontation with international powers that are of strategic importance for its economy. It offered support to the Gazan people through deliveries of humanitarian aid, by taking strong and consistent positions of supporting a Palestinian state in international forums, and by supporting legal action at the International Court of Justice after publication of the 2024 ICJ advisory on the illegality of Israel’s occupation.
Although Jordan was able to absorb economic disruptions related to the Gaza conflict and keeping armed confrontations outside of its borders, the Hashemite Kingdom’s has had to balance conflict potentials that can erupt in the short or long term. Continued Israeli military presence in South Lebanon over the past 12 months has been noted in international media as a “rolling war,” and the continual ceasefire violations and what more than 20 UN-appointed expert observers refer to as the “militarized control” over Gaza, in conjunction with a West Bank regime enacting what the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights refers to as “systemic discrimination and “systemic asphyxiation” of Palestinian rights, can be called a perma-crisis. Under such conditions, Jordanian long-term growth remains subject to future iterations of internal fault lines, unrest, and even strife. Jordan’s flexibility in foreign partnerships would severely suffer in such a scenario, and external cooperation agreements with Israel on water and energy may be further disrupted, two areas vital to its economic and environmental security.
Socio-economic losses and humanitarian consequences
During the Gaza conflict, Jordan maintained strict border control, and did not open its borders to any new influx of refugees from Gaza or West Bank communities targeted by hostile settlers, despite the Kingdom’s shared border with the occupied West Bank. This special vigilance at the time of intense conflicts within the neighboring territories is widely seen as reflecting both security considerations and political sensitivities rooted in Jordanian history.
Vigilance combined with humanitarian and diplomatic support for Palestine were part of the Kingdom’s socioeconomic balancing act between popular pressures and economic survival. Under this calculus, the Jordanian population was spared recurrence of the per-capita cost burden of new refugee camps and large-scale displacements seen in the past decade. Jordan was also spared military destruction and damages, apart from the minor damages incurred by the accidental fall of drones on civilian infrastructure. But estimations of economic losses, and specifically conflict-related negative impact on per-capita incomes and familial livelihoods, have neither risen to the top of global attention nor to highest analytical precision.
In a preliminary estimate of the Gaza conflict’s economic repercussions on the three countries of Jordan, Egypt, and Lebanon during the first three months of armed violence in Gaza, a joint assessment by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the United Nations Economic and Social Commission of Western Asia (ESCWA) put the negative GDP impact at $10.3 billion for the three countries. A projected USD $18 billion loss for 2024 was later invalidated by escalations in Lebanon. Jordan-specific estimates remain imprecise but point to reduced government revenue, delayed infrastructure investment, and slower progress on social protection, education and healthcare.
Sectoral impacts and opportunity costs
Tourism’s dip and rise
According to Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities quarterly review, Jordan’s tourism aggregates in 2023 did not suffer from regional instability but showed increases vis-à-vis the preceding pandemic as the number of visitors improved and tourism receipts increased by 25.8 percent from 2022. However, looking at the period between November 2023 till September 2024 when global headlines were filled with daily coverage of the Gaza conflict, tourism aggregates shifted and expected sectoral revenues of $530 million were not realized according to the Ministry’s quarterly review. Even as visitor entries from the Arabian Gulf region increased, the number of visitors was considered low, as fewer international visitors entered.
While the overall decline in visitor arrivals and tourism receipts in 2024 was minor, tourism and hospitality operators reported changes in cruise ship itineraries away from Aqaba, Jordan’s only port, and flight suspensions at Amman’s Queen Alia airport, which in 2024 saw a single-digit percentage contraction in passenger numbers alter two years of growth. The temporary contraction of visitor numbers affected local businesses, seasonal workers, tour guides, and transport operators. It did not, however, impede medium-term growth of Jordan’s inbound tourism as shown in a strong rebound in tourist arrivals already in January and February of 2025. Over these two months, Jordan recorded the highest number of tourists and receipts since 2010. According toMinistry of Tourism and Antiquities, the country’s tourism revenue for the first quarter of 2025 reached $1.72 billion, a year-on-year 8.9 percent increase.
Trade route disruptions
Accounting for one third of the country’s imports and about half of exports, Jordan’s Port of Aqaba plays a vital role in the country’s trade infrastructure. Attacks were initiated in October 2023 on the vital Gulf of Aden and Red Sea shipping lanes by Yemen’s Houthis, part of the “axis of resistance” that entered the Gaza conflict by attacking Israeli and allegedly Israel-linked targets. Vessel rerouting around the Cape of Good Hope increased fuel and insurance costs and created inflationary pressures for Jordanian producers and consumers.
To mitigate this trade disruption and avoid major drawbacks, the Jordanian government set a temporary exemption on sales taxes and custom duties on maritime shipping costs in January 2024. Al-Aqaba port import and export levels have nonetheless declined dramatically.
Land-based trade across Jordan’s western border has also been impeded. Since the Gaza war escalated, cross-border trade via the King Hussein /Allenby Bridge, Jordan’s primary commercial crossing with the West Bank, has initially remained open and facilitated bilateral trade (albeit 3:1 disparate in favor of Jordanian exports) between Jordan and Palestine at a reported level of above $400 million (2023) but has become more vulnerable.
Following a September 2025 incident where a Jordanian truck driver killed two Israeli soldiers at the crossing point, Israeli authorities closed the Allenby Bridge “indefinitely.” Despite a partial reopening at the end of the same month, forward looking implications for trade are significant, albeit shrouded in uncertainty due to the overall situation. According to records of recent years, a closure has repercussions on deliveries of humanitarian aid shipments to Gaze. About a quarter of the food, tents, and other essential supplies that were sent to Gaza via the UN 2720 mechanism in August 2024 went through Jordan.
A drop in GDP growth rates for Jordan in 2024 from 2023 seems to be signaling the extent of the country’s direct and indirect economic losses from two years of war over and on Gaza. This impact may be recovered organically by GDP growth returning to higher levels, as per IMF projections. Although no consolidated numerical value of the cumulative economic cost to Jordan’s trade and tourism sectors is available, it has to be concluded that both sectors represented the primary channels of conflict-related impact on Jordan in the past two years.
Boycotts, public strikes and consumer behavior
A locally significant, and highly publicized, behavioral economic and social impact of rising Pro-Palestine and Anti-Israel sentiments of Jordanian consumers occurred by way of an increasingly active consumer boycott movement targeting global food and beverage companies that are considered pro-Israel. Boycotting international companies, alongside public strikes, was a way for Jordanians to show support for Palestinians. Local advocacy organizations, civil society networks, and social media platforms helped expand the campaign, turning individual consumer choices into a political and economic statement. While some demand shifted to locally produced goods and local firms, Jordan’s high import-reliance meant that supply chains, packaging, distribution, and franchise operations were negatively impacted. Boycotts have a long history, and while being both ardently declared and denied or met with counter campaigns, their economic impact comprised of supply chain and brand reputation effects, has historically been near impossible to predict.
When energy imports are interrupted
According to the World Integrated Trade Solution, a World Bank platform for trade and tariff data, Jordan’s internal consumption was 57 percent import-dependent in 2023, with food and energy as the sectors with the largest share of imports. Jordan generates a significant portion of its electricity from natural gas, which is mainly imported from Israel and Egypt. The Arab Gas Pipeline, a transregional national gas pipeline that runs from Egypt through Jordan and Syria, has seen disruptions in its flows since the late 2023 regional instability. In the previous decade from 2010 to 2019, which is noted by the Jordanian government as a period of low GDP growth, the kingdom’s energy sector had to grapple with planning and implementation of its first green growth vision and rollout of renewable energy plants, growing domestic power demands and increased generation costs while citizens were faced with contentious reforms to electricity subsidies. Fiscal burdens of the energy sector increased with costly impacts on electricity pricing and public spending.
Furthermore, Jordan’s sustainable freshwater resources are less than 100 cubic meters per person annually, considered far below the worldwide water poverty line as projected in a United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) 2025 report.
As the kingdom’s new water and energy nexus was shaped in the 2010s (juxtaposing poverty in freshwater resources and fossil energy with burgeoning of renewable energy), first purchase agreements for natural gas from offshore Israeli fields Tamar and Leviathan were signed – amidst protests Project Prosperity, – and negotiations for a water-for-renewable energy project commenced. The latter, called Project Prosperity, became politically untenable and suspended due to public objection during the Gaza war.
There are direct costs and opportunity costs associated with postponement of this collaboration project, which had been designed under a regional integration agenda with involvement of the United Arab Emirates and diplomatic support by the USA. Foregone water security benefits and delayed investments in auxiliary infrastructure, reduce Jordan’s negotiation power and weaken its ability to attract green funding for large-scale infrastructure projects. This notwithstanding, with undiminished needs for regional water and energy cooperation over coming decades and in the presence of the Jordanian national water strategy as well as the kingdom’s ambitious economic and social development 2022-2033 roadmap that aims to more than double the annual GPD growth rate seen in the low growth decade of the 2010s and create one million new jobs – a 65 percent increase from 2021 job stock of 1.59 million – under a multi-source capital expenditure vision of 41.4 billion Jordanian dinar ($58.4 billion USD).
Measuring divergencies of real GDP growth and sectoral objectives for manufacturing and its sub-sectors such as food, chemicals, pharmaceuticals, and textile, as well as strategic services in trade, tourism, education, healthcare, and finance, plus the energy and water nexus, against the economic roadmap, which represents the Hashemite Kingdom’s latest development agenda, and its timeline for the coming eight years, could be considered as proxy indicator for the economic losses and opportunity costs that Jordan faces in a post-conflict scenario of non-violence from 2026 onward.
A neighbor to suffering
More immediately, although Jordan’s population has not directly been impacted by the conflict in Gaza in terms of their physical health, there are costs to the healthcare system. Costs directly related to the Gaza conflict entail the operation of a field hospital in the enclave, the provision of emergency medical care to civilians, including burn treatment, as well as trauma therapy, and treatment for long-term illnesses. Jordan’s substantial participation in regional humanitarian response is demonstrated by the close coordination between foreign humanitarian groups and Jordanian medical personnel. Additionally, the field hospital has served as a symbol of Jordan’s humanitarian and political support for the Palestinian people.
Indirect psychosocial effects are impacting Jordan as well. Psychosocial stress levels and mental health among the country’s host communities and refugee populations have significantly increased, according to UNICEF 2023 Integration of Mental Health and Psychosocial Support in Primary Health Care report, with high cases of anxiety, fear, and grief, especially in urban areas like Amman, Zarqa, and Irbid. Furthermore, the UNICEF 2024 annual report on Jordan described that through political mobilization, media coverage, and familial ties to Gaza, where many Jordanian families have relatives, these populations have been exposed to the conflict in an indirect manner. In addition to increased tension during times of increased violence, mental health professionals report an increase in anxiety, despair, grief, and emotional distress, especially among young people and vulnerable populations. These mental burdens and the related costs must be expected to outlast the validity of any economic development plan. A September 2025 investment case by the Jordanian Ministry of Health and World Health Organization on mental health in Jordan found that in 2023 mental health conditions imposed an economic burden of approximately 251.8 million Jordanian dinars, equivalent to about 0.75 percent of the country’s GDP, including both direct healthcare expenditures and substantial indirect costs such as lost productivity
In the end, what emerges from Jordan’s position in the post–October 7 regional landscape is less a distinct economic imprint than a confirmation of the country’s structural exhaustion. The war in Gaza may have sent measurable macro-shocks across neighboring economies, but in Jordan those signals have been absorbed—muted, refracted, or simply lost. What does stand out is the degree to which Jordan’s vulnerability is now systemic rather than episodic: exposure to climate stress, reliance on remittances, dwindling state capacity, and deepening poverty leave little buffer against any external shock, whether geopolitical or environmental. As the region recalibrates to a new equilibrium of protracted instability, Jordan’s trajectory is a warning that without regional integration, peace and stability, every new crisis adds an additional layer of drawn-out economic fatigue.
