JERUSALEM — Gunmen opened fire during a funeral at a church in Jordan on Friday, killing seven people and wounding 40 others, authorities said.
The shooting took place at a Greek Orthodox church in Karak, about 180 kilometers (110 miles) south of the capital, Amman.
Jordan declared three days of national mourning, according to the kingdom's Petra News Agency.
Footage broadcast on Jordanian state television showed 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 approaches 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 Health Minister Ibrahim al-Budour said two of those wounded are in critical condition.
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.”
Jordan’s Prime Minister Jafar Hassan said during a security meeting in Karak on Friday evening that the attack was a result of terrorist ideology and blind extremism. He said the assailants will be punished and legal measures taken against those who seek to introduce extremism.
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.
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned the attack during a funeral as “especially heinous,” spokesman Stephane Dujarric said. “The secretary-general also calls for all those responsible to be found and to be held to account.”