Gunmen open fire at a church during a funeral in Jordan, killing 7 and wounding 34
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JERUSALEM (AP) — Gunmen opened fire during a funeral at a church in Jordan on Friday, killing seven people and wounding 34 others, authorities said.
The shooting took place at a Greek Orthodox church in Karak, about 180 kilometers (110 miles) south of the capital, Amman.
Images being broadcast on Jordanian state television show two gunmen who appear to be holding pistols approaching the church and firing shots. A third man who appears to be holding a semiautomatic rifle then appears and opens fire, and all three then run toward the church.
A government statement said that the attack was “carried out by unknown assailants,” but didn’t say whether any gunmen were captured or killed. It said that “investigations are underway at full speed.”
Karak is home to a minority Christian population.
In 2016, gunmen ambushed police in a series of attacks in Karak, including at a Crusader castle popular with tourists, killing 10 people, including seven officers, and wounding dozens. Jordanian security forces killed those gunmen after a long standoff.
Jordan’s director of public security, Maj. Gen. Obeidallah Maaytah, said at a news conference that 27 of the wounded in Friday’s shooting were still being treated.
King Abdullah II said on X that Jordan “will confront the terrorist act that targeted Karak with the harshest penalties” and offered his “deepest condolences to the families of the martyrs, and our wishes for recovery to the wounded.”
Condemnation of the slayings came from around the region, including from Lebanon, Syria, Egypt and Oman.
Ahmed al-Tayeb in Cairo, the grand imam of Al-Azhar, the Sunni Muslim world’s foremost religious institution, offered his condolences to the families of victims in Friday’s shooting, calling it a “heinous terrorist attack.”
Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein called his Jordanian counterpart and “affirmed Iraq’s solidarity with Jordan in the face of terrorism,” Hussein’s office said in a statement.