Senior security officials in Jordan said that security forces arrested two brothers and their brother-in-law after an exchange of fire, Monday (October 26) in connection with an attack that targeted a church and resulted in deaths. They stated that the suspects did not appear to have links to other cells.
The authorities confirmed that the "three terrorists" were Jordanians. The authorities reported immediately after the attack on the Church of St. George in the village of Hamoud in southern Jordan, which killed nine people and injured 25 others, that the perpetrators were “extremists.”
The Public Security Directorate said in a statement that the security services were able, at dawn, “to determine the whereabouts of the three terrorists” who were “barricaded inside one of the abandoned houses in Karak.” She added that they "refused to surrender and began firing shots at the security force," which clashed with them until "they gained control and arrested them after they were all wounded, without any casualties among the ranks of the security force."
For his part, the Director of Public Security in Jordan, Major General Abdullah Al-Maaytah, announced the names of the attackers who belonged to the same family, accusing them of “carrying Takfiri ideology.” Al-Maaytah said in a press conference, "The perpetrators of the terrorist attack are all from one family. Two of them are brothers and the third is their relative. They all carry Takfiri ideology and live near the town of Al-Hamoud." The official Al-Mamlaka TV channel reported that the attackers were taken to hospital, noting that “the health condition of one of them is serious, while the health condition of the other two is stable.”
Commenting on the arrest, Jordanian King Abdullah II said on the “X” platform, “We said that terrorists will not escape punishment, and no thinker who differentiates between Jordanian and Jordanian will escape punishment.”
Interior Minister Mazen Al-Faraya said in statements to Al-Mamlaka TV that the attackers had been identified “since the beginning of the terrorist incident and they were holed up in a building inside one of the villages near the site of the incident.” He pointed out that "they are all Jordanian, and there is no indication that they have any external contacts or cooperation with external parties."
The Public Security statement confirmed that “a group of firearms and equipment” were seized in the place where they were located.
Government pledges
On Friday, the three gunmen attacked the church, where nearly two hundred people were present to participate in a funeral. They opened fire randomly outside the church and then inside it, chasing the people who panicked and tried to hide. Then they fled.
Al-Faraya said on “X”, “We caught the killers, and we are reviewing all the circumstances that lead young people to extremism.” He pledged to "hold accountable everyone proven to have participated" in the attack, adding, "We will turn this tragedy into measures that protect the lives of citizens."
Christians constitute approximately three percent of Jordan's population of approximately 11 million, and they generally practice their religious rituals peacefully among a Sunni majority. The Minister of Government Communications, the official spokesman for the government, Muhammad Al-Momani, confirmed in a post on the He added, "We stand on guard and will strike with an iron fist, without mercy or leniency, anyone who tries to harm Jordan's security and the safety of its citizens." Jordanian law punishes murder by death by hanging.
On Sunday, hundreds of Jordanians mourned eight of the nine victims who died during the attack, led by Prime Minister Jaafar Hassan, amid an atmosphere of prayer and sadness. They were buried in a grave opposite the church, over which a monument will be erected in their memory. Crown Prince Hussein bin Abdullah and Queen Rania participated in offering condolences in the village.
Jordanian air strikes in Syria and casualties
In a statement on Monday evening, the Jordanian army announced that it had carried out “a specific operation targeting the hideouts of terrorist organizations in southern Syria,” noting that this was “in retaliation for the martyrs of the Karak Church... as the terrorists who carried out this criminal act are linked to these terrorist organizations.” The raids resulted in “the destruction of sites” and “the killing and wounding of many members of these organizations,” according to the statement.
However, the official Syrian News Agency (SANA) quoted a health official in Daraa Governorate (south) as saying that “five civilian victims, including women and children,” were killed as a result of Jordanian air strikes on several sites in the governorate. Later, the Health Directorate in Daraa Governorate said, “Daraa Governorate hospitals have so far received 8 victims, including an elderly man, 3 children, and 4 people with varying injuries as a result of the Jordanian air strikes,” after the death toll was five.
Medical sources in Daraa Governorate told the German News Agency (DPA): “7 people from one family, including children and women, were killed in the village of Lutf in the Al-Lajat area in the northeastern countryside of Daraa as a result of the Jordanian air strikes.”
The official SANA news agency quoted a statement from the Syrian government stating that “no coordination had taken place regarding this military operation with the Syrian side in advance,” adding that the authorities had initiated “careful investigations to determine the full circumstances of this targeting, in parallel with opening current and currently open channels of communication with our brothers in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan.”
