Prominent Jordanian sisters jumped to death in suicide pact. Or was it murder?

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Jordanians are mourning the deaths of two prominent sisters whose bodies were discovered together at the base of a building in Amman over the weekend, according to local media reports. Soraya Salti, 44, was a successful entrepreneur who was named one of the 100 most powerful Arab women by Arabian Business in 2013, and Jumana Salti, 37, had been a director at PricewaterhouseCoopers in United Arab Emirates since 2008.

Family acquaintances said the Salti sisters were at the Bisharat Golf Club in a southern suburb of the capital Friday. Their bodies were later found at a nearby building by an Egyptian janitor after he heard a thud and called the police. The cause of their deaths is still under investigation, but a forensic autopsy Saturday showed the sisters suffered multiple fractures, according to the National newspaper in United Arab Emirates.

Some local media reported that the Salti sisters had committed suicide together by jumping off the building in Jwiedeh, while many Jordanians -- including family and friends -- suspected murder.

“I find it difficult to believe that they have committed suicide,” Marwan Muasher, a former foreign minister and former deputy prime minister of Jordan, wrote on his Facebook page in Arabic on Saturday. “I knew both and they were full of life and loved life. I was Jumana’s basketball coach when she was 8.”

The Salti sisters came from a prominent Jordanian family and were well-known for their success in entrepreneurship and business. Soraya Salti, a mother of one, was the founder of Injaz Al-Arab, an education initiative that aims to empower youth and promote entrepreneurship across the Arab world. She won the Schwab Social Entrepreneur award for Jordan in 2006 and was named a Young Global Leader of the World Economic Forum. In 2009, she became the first Arab woman to win the Skoll Award for Social Entrepreneurship, the National said.
Her sister, Jumana, was part of the government and public sector strategy team at PricewaterhouseCoopers. She earned a master’s degree in economics from the London School of Economics and Political Science in 2006. She had previously worked at the Jordanian Royal Court on economic and socio-econonomic issues for four years. The two women were also American citizens through their mother, Rebecca Salti.

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