Three men sentenced to death in Jordan over church mass shooting

A Jordanian court has sentenced three men to death by hanging for carrying out a fatal mass shooting on a church last month.

The attack on 23 October killed nine people and injured 34 others who had been attending a Christian funeral at a Greek Orthodox church in Karak governorate.

Jordan’s Armed Forces said in a statement on Sunday that the men had been convicted of committing “terrorist acts”, as well as possessing weapons, “promoting the ideas of a terrorist organisation” and “conspiracy to commit terrorist acts”.

The three men – two Jordanian brothers and their brother-in-law – fled the scene of the attack and were arrested three days later. They have not been publicly identified.

Karak is home to a sizeable Christian community in the Muslim-majority kingdom.

CCTV footage from the day of the attack showed three men holding guns approaching and firing on St George’s church in the village of Hmoud.