Why did human rights claims have such a limited impact on the authoritarian status quo in the Middle East prior to the Arab Spring - and why are they so often thwarted now? What factors have shaped human rights debates and outcomes in the region? Addressing these questions, Bosmat Yefet offers a comparative analysis, both empirically grounded and theoretically sophisticated, of the forces variously supporting and resisting the full embrace of human rights in Egypt and Jordan since the 1990s.