Women in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, and Palestine have formed non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and worked in them since the beginning of the twentieth century. At the beginning of the twentieth century, these women were generally urban-based upper- and middle-class educated women who aimed to contribute to solving social, economic, and political problems present in their societies. Some of the organizations that they formed started out as charitable in nature. Supporting poorer segments of the population, some aimed to raise awareness of …