At a park in the east Amman neighborhood of Marka, a local street cat stalks two small birds past shrubs and saplings. Deema Assaf, an architect turned environmentalist, stops talking for a moment to watch the interaction. Only a few feet from the oblivious birds, the cat freezes. Then it loses interest and walks away, curling up near Assaf in a rare patch of weeds—most of the unwanted vegetation was pulled the day before by volunteers. The birds are much thicker in the morning, Assaf says. And cats are not…
