last wife and widow of King Hussein of Jordan. She was queen consort of Jordan between 1978 and 1999. Since her husband's death in 1999, she has been queen dowager of Jordan.American by birth, of Syrian, [1] British and Swedish descent, she acquired Jordanian citizenship and renounced her American citizenship at the time of her marriage. She is the current president of the United World Colleges movement and an advocate of the anti-nuclear weapons proliferation campaign, Global Zero.
Noor was born Lisa Najeeb Halaby in Washington, D.C. She is the daughter of Najeeb Halaby and Doris Carlquist. Her father was an aviator, airline executive and government official. He served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense in the Truman administration, before being appointed by John F. Kennedy to head the Federal Aviation Administration. Najeeb Halaby also had a successful private-sector career, serving as CEO of Pan American World Airways from 1969 to 1972. The Halabys had two children in addition to Lisa: a son, Christian, and another daughter, Alexa. They divorced in 1977.
Noor's paternal grandfather, Najeeb Elias Halaby, a Syrian immigrant of Lebanese origin, was a petroleum broker, according to 1920 Census records.[2] Merchant Stanley Marcus, however, recalled that in the mid-1920s, Halaby opened Halaby Galleries, a rug boutique and interior-decorating shop, at Neiman-Marcus in Dallas, Texas, and ran it with his Texas-born wife, Laura Wilkins (1889–1987, later Mrs. Urban B. Koen). Halaby died shortly afterward, and his estate was unable to continue the new enterprise.[3]
According to research done in 2010 for the PBS series Faces of America by Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr., of Harvard University, her great-grandfather, Elias Halaby, came to New York around 1891, one of the earliest Syrian immigrants to the United States. He had been a Christian and provincial treasurer (magistrate) in the Ottoman Empire. He left Syria with his two eldest sons. His wife Almas and remaining children joined him in the USA in 1894. He died three years later, leaving his teenage sons, Habib, and Najeeb (her paternal grandfather), to run his import business. Najeeb moved to Dallas, Texas around 1910 and fully assimilated into American society.[1]
[edit] Education
Lisa Halaby was born, raised and educated in the United States. She attended National Cathedral School from fourth to eighth grade. She briefly attended The Chapin School in New York City's Manhattan, then went on to Concord Academy in Massachusetts. She entered Princeton University with its first coeducational freshman class, and received a BA in Architecture and Urban Planning in 1973.[4]
[edit] Career
After she graduated, Halaby moved to Australia, where she worked for a firm that specialized in planning new towns. She became increasingly interested in the Middle East and immediately accepted a job offer from a British architectural firm that had been employed to redesign the city of Tehran.[5]
In 1976, Halaby moved back to the United States. She thought about earning a master's degree in journalism and starting a career in television production. However, she accepted a job offer from her father, who was commissioned by the Jordanian government to redesign their airlines. She became Director of Facilities Planning and Design of the airline he founded.[5]
In 1977, Halaby, who attended various high-profile social events as the Director of Facilities Planning and Design, met King Hussein of Jordan for the first time on the development of the Queen Alia International Airport. The airport was named after Queen Alia, King Hussein's third wife, who died in a helicopter crash the same year. Halaby became a friend of the King, who was still mourning after the death of his wife. Their friendship evolved into romance and the couple became engaged in 1978.[5]
[edit] Marriage and children
Queen Noor in Hamburg, Germany, in 1978
Queen Noor and King Hussein with Richard von Weizsäcker, President of Germany, and First Lady Marianne von Weizsäcker in Jordan in 1985Halaby married the King on 15 June 1978 in Amman, becoming his fourth wife and Queen of Jordan. She renounced her USA citizenship upon marriage and converted to Islam, becoming known as Noor Al-Hussein (which means Light of Hussein). The Constitution of Jordan did not require her to convert but if she had not done so, her descendants would not have had succession rights.[6] The wedding was a traditional Muslim ceremony. Initially, the new queen was not accepted by the people of Jordan, as she was not of Arab Muslim birth. Although their opinion is thought to have changed as Noor started expressing genuine interest and commitment to her kingdom,[5] the differences were never completely resolved.[7]
Upon marriage, Noor assumed the management of the royal household and three of her stepchildren, Princess Haya bint Al Hussein, Prince Ali bin Al Hussein, and Abir Muhaisen, the children of her husband by Queen Alia.[5] Queen Noor and King Hussein had four children:
Prince Hamzah (born 29 March 1980), Crown Prince from 1999 to 2004, who has a daughter
Prince Hashim (born 10 June 1981), who has two daughters
Princess Iman (born 24 April 1983)
Princess Raiyah (born 9 February 1986)
Behind the scenes, Queen Noor was involved in politics, for which she was criticized by fundamentalists. In 1984, she supported her husband when he criticized the Americans for being one-sided in their commitment to Israel, while the Americans criticized her for siding with the Jordanians.[5]
There have been tensions between Queen Noor and her sister-in-law, Princess Sarvath El Hassan, the wife of King Hussein's brother Hassan, who served as Crown Prince of Jordan until the last days of King Hussein's life. The tensions between the Queen and the then Crown Princess were exacerbated by the matter of succession. Queen Noor, who almost never left the King's side during his illness, entertained the idea of having her own son Hamzah proclaimed Crown Prince, influencing her husband to change the line of succession in his favour. Eventually Hussein, encouraged by Noor, appointed his eldest son Abdullah (from his marriage to the English-born Princess Muna) as Crown Prince, the condition for such change being that Noor's son Hamzah become Crown Prince upon Abdullah's accession.[8][9]
[edit] Widowhood
King Hussein died on 7 February 1999.
After the death of King Hussein, his firstborn son Abdullah became king and Hamzah became Crown Prince. A surprise move of 2004, Prince Hamzah was stripped of his title as Jordan's next in line.[10] On 2 July 2009, King Abdullah II named his eldest son as heir to the throne, ending five years of speculation over his successor.[11]
Though the queen dowager, she is stepmother to King Abdullah II and thus cannot be classified as queen mother; accordingly she is known as HM Queen Noor of Jordan, as distinct from Abdullah's wife Queen Rania, who is styled HM The Queen of Jordan. The present King's mother is Princess Muna al-Hussein, an Englishwoman formerly known as Antoinette Avril Gardiner.
[edit] Affiliations and international activities
Queen Noor after the 2006 FIFA World Cup match between Argentina and Germany.
Queen Noor at Women's World Award in 2009
Styles of
Queen Noor as consort
Reference style Her Majesty
Spoken style Your Majesty
Alternative style Ma'am
Jordanian Royal Family
HM The King
HM The Queen
HRH The Crown Prince
HRH Princess Iman
HRH Princess Salma
HRH Prince Hashem
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HM Queen Noor
Extended royal family[show]HRH Prince Hamzah HRH Princess HayaHRH Prince Hashim
HRH Princess Fahdah HRH Princess HaalahHRH Princess Rayet Al NoorHRH Princess ImanHRH Princess Raiyah
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HRH Princess HayaHRH Prince Ali
HRH Princess Rym HRH Princess JalilahHRH Prince AbdullahMiss Abir Muhaisen
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HRH Princess Dina
HRH Princess Alia
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HRH Princess Muna
HRH Prince Faisal
HRH Princess Sara HRH Princess AyahHRH Prince OmarHRH Princess SaraHRH Princess AishaHRH Princess AishaHRH Princess Zein
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HRH Prince Muhammad
HRH Princess Taghrid
HRH Prince Talal
HRH Princess Ghida HRH Prince HusseinHRH Prince MuhammadHRH Princess RajaaHRH Prince Ghazi
HRH Princess Areej HRH Princess TasneemHRH Prince AbdullahHRH Princess Jennah
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HRH Prince El Hassan
HRH Princess Sarvath
HRH Princess RahmaHRH Princess SumayaHRH Princess BadiyaHRH Prince Rashid
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HRH Princess Basma
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HRH Prince Ali
HRH Princess Reema
HRH Prince Muhammad
HRH Princess Sima HRH Prince HamzahHRH Princess RaniaHRH Princess KarmaHRH Princess Na'afaHRH Princess RajwaHRH Princess Basma Fatima
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HRH Prince Asem
HRH Princess Sana
HRH Princess YasmineHRH Princess SarahHRH Princess NoorHRH Princess SalhaHRH Princess NejlaHRH Prince Nayef
Queen Noor plays an active role in promoting international exchange and understanding of Arab and Muslim culture and politics, Arab-Western relations, and conflict-prevention and recovery issues such as refugees, missing persons, poverty and disarmament. She has also helped found media programs to highlight these issues. Her conflict-recovery and peacebuilding work over the past decade has focused on the Middle East, the Balkans, Central and Southeast Asia, Latin America and Africa.
Queen Noor's work in Jordan and the Arab world has focused on national development needs in the areas of education, conservation, sustainable development, human rights and cross-cultural understanding. She is also actively involved with international and UN organizations that address global challenges in these fields.
Since 1979, the initiatives of the Noor Al Hussein Foundation (NHF) which she chairs have transformed development thinking in Jordan and the Middle East through pioneering programs in the areas of poverty eradication and sustainable development, women's empowerment, microfinance, health, environmental conservation, and arts as a medium for social development and cross-cultural exchange, many of which are internationally acclaimed models for the developing world. NHF provides training and assistance in implementing these best practice programs in the broader Arab and Asian regions.(Wikipédia)
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