Jordan writer shot dead outside court
HATTAR FACED CHARGES OF CONTEMPT OF RELIGION AFTER SHARING A CARICATURE
Nahed Hattar was to stand trial for contempt of religion after sharing on social media a cartoon offending Islam |
Agunman shot dead Jordanian writer Nahed Hattar yesterday outside the court where he was to stand trial on charges of contempt of religion after sharing on social media a caricature seen as insulting Islam, state news agency Petra said.
It said the gunman was arrested at the scene.
Hattar, a Christian and an anti-Islamist activist who was a supporter of Syrian President Bashar Al Assad, was arrested last month after he shared a caricature that depicted a bearded man in heaven smoking in bed with women and asking God to bring him wine and cashews.
Many conservative Muslim Jordanians considered Hattar’s move offensive and against their religion. The authorities said he violated the law by sharing the caricature.
The state news agency quoted a security source as saying Hattar was killed by a man who fired three shots at him on the steps of the palace of justice in the Jordanian capital.
Two witnesses said the gunman, bearded and in his 50s, was wearing a traditional Arab kandora, worn by ultra conservative Salafists who adhere to a puritanical version of Islam and shun Western lifestyles.
Hattar had apologised and said he did not mean to insult God but had shared the cartoon to mock fundamentalists and what he said was their vision of God and heaven. He had accused his Islamist opponents of using the cartoon to settle scores with him. The attorney general had imposed a blackout media coverage of the case against Hattar. The Jordanian government denounced his killing as a “heinous crime”.
“The law will be firmly applied to the person who committed the crime and the government will strike with an iron fist anyone who dares to take advantage of this to spread hate speech,” said spokesman Mohammad Momani.
The opposition Muslim Brotherhood and Dar Al Iftaa, the highest religious authority, also condemned the attack.
The state news agency quoted a security source as saying Hattar was killed by a man who fired three shots at him on the steps of the palace of justice in the Jordanian capital.