A military-run court in Jordan sentenced three men to death on Sunday after they were convicted in connection with an attack at a church last month that killed nine people, the Jordanian Armed Forces said in a statement.
The shooting at a Greek Orthodox church, which also wounded about three dozen people, was one of the deadliest militant attacks in the country in years, and King Abdullah II vowed that it would be met with “the harshest retaliation.”
The three men were sentenced after being convicted of violating antiterrorism laws, according to the Jordanian military. They were found guilty of carrying out deadly terrorist acts, possessing weapons and ammunition with the intent to commit terrorism, and promoting the ideas of a terrorist group.
That group was not named in the armed forces statement.
The sentences are subject to appeal, the military statement noted.
The three men were arrested in late October in Jordan after a shootout with security forces during a predawn raid on their hide-out in an abandoned house in the southern province of Karak, where the church attack took place. Karak is home to a sizable Christian community.
King Abdullah praised the arrests on social media. “No proponent of dark ideologies that divide Jordanians will be tolerated,” he wrote.
Jordanian officials have not said what motivated the shooting at the church. Shortly afterward, Prime Minister Jafar Hassan said it was “the result of terrorist takfiri ideology,” using an Arabic phrase that often describes Islamist extremists who declare other Muslims heretics.
The sentencing on Sunday came a weeks after Jordan retaliated for the church attack with deadly airstrikes on Islamic State targets in southern Syria, a Jordanian government spokesman said at the time. The Jordanian military said it had been “targeting hide-outs of terrorist organizations,” without naming any specific group.
The airstrikes in Syria killed at least seven civilians, including three children, according to the Syrian civil defense rescue service, and the attack was condemned by Syrian officials.
Muslims make up more than 97 percent of the population in Jordan, and Christians make up about 2 percent, according to United States government estimates. The country’s Constitution declares Islam the state religion but safeguards the free exercise of religion and bars discrimination on religious grounds. Christian Jordanians are guaranteed seats in Parliament and have long served as cabinet ministers and ambassadors.
The Christian presence in Karak dates back more than 1,500 years, and there are multiple churches there to this day. Jordan also has important biblical and Christian pilgrimage sites, including one along the Jordan River where Jesus was said to have been baptized.
In June, Jordan hanged six men convicted of terrorism-related or drug-trafficking charges. The executions came after a nine-year hiatus in executions and were condemned by the European Union and human rights groups, including the Death Penalty Information Center and Human Rights Watch.
Raja Abdulrahim contributed reporting.
