William Halsa was standing beside a relative’s casket inside the Greek Orthodox Church in the Jordanian town of Hammoud, in Karak governorate, on Friday afternoon when he heard gunfire outside.
He approached a window to see what was happening and saw a gunman aiming his weapon at him. Halsa threw himself to the floor to take cover from the bullets.
In the church courtyard, where dozens of mourners had gathered for Imtithal al-Halsa’s funeral, gunmen opened fire in an attack that killed seven people and wounded 34 others, according to Jordanian authorities.
“We went out to see what had happened. It was truly a horrifying scene — young men lying on the ground, bodies, screaming, blood and wounded people,” Halsa, a cousin of Imtithal al-Halsa, said in an interview with MBN. “The shock was enormous, and the fear kept growing.”
The attack took place in a town where Muslims and Christians have long coexisted but revived memories of extremist attacks in in Jordan over the past two decades, including a 2016 assault in the city of Karak claimed by the Islamic State group.
Jordanian Interior Minister Mazen al-Faraya described Friday’s shooting as a “terrorist attack” carried out by “a group of extremists” but said it was too early to determine whether the perpetrators were linked to outside actors.
No group had claimed responsibility for the attack by Friday evening, while security forces continued searching for suspects.
Minutes of Terror
Several elderly women and children were inside the church, which can accommodate about 100 people, while roughly 100 young men had gathered in its courtyard to attend the funeral.
According to eyewitnesses and security-camera footage from the church entrance, three young men arrived at the scene. One was dressed in clothing that appeared to suggest an affiliation with the Salafi-jihadi movement.
One of the men was carrying a handgun. Another, whose head was covered, was armed with a Kalashnikov rifle. The two gunmen began taking turns firing at people in the courtyard. The role of the third man, who appeared to be unarmed, was unclear.
All three fled in a small blue pickup truck.
Halsa said the gunmen did not enter the church itself, where he was standing with family members.
“God was merciful and protected us,” he said.
The attackers, Halsa said, are “people without mercy.”
Witnesses said civil defense teams arrived at the scene and began evacuating the wounded and the dead, all of whom were men.
Public Security Directorate chief, Maj. Gen. Obeidallah al-Maaytah, said in a news conference in Karak alongside the interior minister that security services received the first report at about 2:10 p.m. He said 27 wounded people were still receiving medical treatment.
Al-Faraya said security agencies were pursuing the perpetrators and had the names of suspects who were being sought, without disclosing their identities. The interior minister stressed that authorities could not yet determine whether the attackers had foreign links or identify who was behind the operation.
King Abdullah II visited hospitals in Karak to check on the wounded and vowed that those responsible would be held accountable.
“Whoever imagined that treacherous bullets could divide Jordanians will see their effort defeated by our resilience and unity,” the king said in a post on X.
Prime Minister Jafar Hassan described the attack as the product of “terrorist takfiri ideology and blind extremism,” pledging to confront attempts to spread extremism and incite sectarian strife.
Who Was Behind the Attack?
As the investigation began, experts who spoke to MBN said they believed the attack could be linked to groups that embrace the ideology of the Islamic State group, also known as ISIS, citing the nature of the target and the method of attack.
They stressed, however, that these were analytical assessments, not the findings of a security investigation.
Murad Batal al-Shishani, founder of the Rimarcs group for the analysis of political violence, said the targeting of civilians during a religious ceremony bore characteristics associated with attacks by Salafi-jihadi groups, particularly ISIS.
He said selecting a civilian gathering at a place of worship was intended to spread fear and create a broad sense of shock and could undermine public confidence in the security services while encouraging other extremists to carry out similar attacks.
Waleed al-Oweimer, dean of the College of Social Sciences and a specialist in counterterrorism, agreed, saying the attack showed signs of advance planning rather than being the spontaneous act of an individual.
Al-Oweimer said the assailants detonated a small explosive device near the church before opening fire. Authorities have not confirmed those details.
“I tend to believe they are from ISIS or from groups that embrace ISIS ideology,” he said. “This was not an individual act carried out in reaction to something.”
Al-Oweimer said the attack suggested that extremist cells capable of operating inside Jordan may still exist despite security crackdowns in recent years.
But he also suggested the operation might have been intended as a message to the Jordanian state over its positions on regional conflicts, including the war with Iran and tensions involving Israel, Saudi Arabia and Yemen.
No public evidence has emerged so far linking the attackers to those issues or showing that the assault was carried out in retaliation for Jordanian government policies.
Karak and the Memory of Previous Attacks
Karak governorate has previously been targeted by extremist groups.
On Dec. 18, 2016, gunmen attacked security forces before barricading themselves inside Karak’s historic castle. The clashes killed 10 people, including seven security personnel and a Canadian tourist, and wounded dozens of others.
ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack, which ended with the deaths of four gunmen.
In August 2018, an extremist cell targeted a security patrol near a festival in the city of Fuheis, west of Amman, before security forces tracked the group to a building in the city of Salt. The two incidents left five security personnel dead, according to authorities.
The interior minister at the time said the cell’s members embraced Islamic State ideology and had planned attacks on security installations and public gatherings.
One of the deadliest attacks in Jordan’s modern history occurred in November 2005, when al-Qaida in Iraq carried out suicide bombings targeting three hotels in Amman, killing dozens of people.
ISIS also provoked widespread outrage in Jordan after burning captured Jordanian pilot Muath al-Kasasbeh alive in Syria, a killing the group announced in 2015. Kasasbeh was from Karak.
Despite that history, the targeting of a Christian gathering during a funeral marks a notable development in the nature of attacks the kingdom has experienced.
A Town Known for Coexistence
Hammoud lies north of the city of Karak in a governorate that is home to longstanding Christian tribes whose roots stretch back centuries and that maintain close social ties with Muslim tribes.
Historically, Karak has been one of Jordan’s most prominent centers of Christian life, with Christian and Muslim families participating together in the country’s political and social life. Migration and demographic changes have since contributed to a decline in the proportion of Christians in the area.
Christians today make up a small minority in Jordan, estimated at about 2% to 3% of the population, according to church estimates and religious freedom reports.
Under the current electoral system, nine seats are reserved for Christians in Jordan’s 138-member House of Representatives.
Al-Oweimer said some areas in southern Jordan suffer from economic and social conditions that extremist groups may exploit for recruitment, particularly among young people facing unemployment and limited economic opportunities.
The size of Jordan’s Salafi-jihadi movement, however, is difficult to determine. Al-Oweimer estimated that about 3,000 people are affiliated with it, a figure that could not be independently verified.
The identities and motives of those who carried out the Hammoud attack remain unknown pending the findings of the investigation.
In the town, meanwhile, residents who had come to bury one man are now mourning seven more.
Adapted and translated from the original Arabic.
