Jordan strikes southern Syria after Karak church attack, Syria says 8 killed

Jordan's air force carried out strikes in southern Syria on Monday evening, which the Jordanian army described as a response to the shooting at a church in Jordan days earlier. N12 reported the Jordanian military's statement that it had attacked terror targets across the border in reaction to the church attack, and The Jerusalem Post reported that Jordan had linked the attackers to what it called 'terrorist groups' before launching the strikes.

Syria disputes key parts of Jordan's account. According to Ynet, Jordan said the operation had been coordinated, but Damascus denied this, said civilians had been killed and announced it had opened an investigation. Syrian figures for the dead rose through the evening, from five to eight, The Times of Israel reported.

The church attack that preceded the strikes

The strikes followed a shooting at a church in Karak, a city in southern Jordan. A Reuters photograph published by The Jerusalem Post showed security forces standing guard as preparations were made for the funeral of victims in Karak on October 25, 2026. News.co.il said the shooting took place on Friday in southern Jordan.

Ynet's account describes three Islamist gunmen opening fire during a funeral held at a church, and says Jordanian forces captured all three in the hours before the air force went into action. The reports differ on how many people were killed in that attack: Ynet's main article puts the number at nine, while an earlier Ynet alert, quoting the Jordanian side, said 7 people were murdered. The reports available do not explain the gap.

What Jordan says it hit

According to the Jordanian army statement relayed by the Telegram channel Abu Ali Express, the air force struck targets in southern Syria belonging to terror organisations connected to the Karak shooting. That statement said the operation was carried out in coordination with the Syrian government and killed many terror operatives, and it framed the strikes explicitly as retaliation for the attack. Ynet said the targets were hideouts used by terror groups in south-eastern Syria.

Jordan has not, in the material available, named the organisations it says were behind the church attack, nor said how many sites were hit.

What Syria says happened

Syria's official news agency, SANA (the Syrian Arab News Agency), said five civilians, among them women and children, were killed in Jordanian air force strikes on the outskirts of Daraa, according to N12. Daraa is a city in southern Syria close to the Jordanian border. Later reports raised the figure: Ynet and The Times of Israel both reported that Syria now says 8 people were killed in the strikes in the south of the country. News.co.il gave a figure of seven Syrian civilians killed in a town in the Daraa area.

News.co.il also reported that the government it called the 'Julani government' said the strike had not been coordinated. Abu Mohammed al-Julani is the nom de guerre long used by Ahmed al-Sharaa, who now leads Syria's government in Damascus. Ynet carried a Syrian statement saying an investigation had been launched.

Two accounts that do not match

The core disagreement is over who was killed and whether Damascus agreed to the operation. Jordan's military says it struck terror operatives with the Syrian government's coordination. Syria says the dead were civilians, including women and children, and that it was not consulted. The reports also describe the location differently: Jordanian statements refer to southern or south-eastern Syria in general terms, while Syrian accounts place the strikes around Daraa.

What the reports do not say

• None of the reports names the groups Jordan holds responsible for the church shooting, or identifies the three captured gunmen.
• The reports give conflicting tolls for the church attack, nine in one account and 7 in another, and for the strikes in Syria, ranging from five to 8, with seven in a third report.
• There is no independent confirmation of whether those killed in Syria were civilians, militants or both.
• The reports do not say whether any coordination took place at any level between Amman and Damascus, beyond the two governments' opposing statements.
• No report describes the weapons or aircraft used, or whether further strikes are planned.