Police searching for kidnappers after organiser of banned ideological conference found

AMMAN — Police on Saturday said they were searching for suspects who reportedly abducted and tortured the Mominoun (believers) Without Borders (MWB) secretary general over the weekend.

MWB Secretary General Younis Qandil was reported missing by his family on Friday night in the Tareq area, a senior police official said.

“Investigators found his vehicle but he was not inside, and following intense investigations we were able to locate him and referred him to the hospital,” the police source told The Jordan Times without any further elaborations.

But a close friend of Qandil, Mousa Barhouma, told The Jordan Times: “Younis was abducted by three hooded men, who tortured him for hours, burnt parts of his body, including his tongue, with lighters and hot metal and declared him an apostate and an infidel while they were doing this.”

“The abductors put a hoodie on his head and told him that he was rigged with explosives that will detonate if he moves and left him in a deserted area until he was found by police at around 4am on Saturday,” Barhouma said.

Younis was one of the organisers of a conference on contemporary religious narratives, which was recently cancelled by the Interior Ministry after receiving a complaint by Amman Third District Islamist MP Dima Tahboub who said one of the papers was offensive to God and the Islamic religion.

The Masarat Centre conference for ideological enlightenment, was scheduled to be held in early November after securing the necessary official approvals, with the participation of 50 religious scholars and researchers from Jordan and abroad.

The lectures listed on the organisers’ website caused controversy on social media, with activists and influencers urging a ban on the event, arguing that some of its content could include blasphemy and contradict with the religious values of Jordanian society.

The conference, which was to be held in cooperation with MWB, sought to discuss several topics, including contemporary religious narratives, modernised ideological models and religious media discourse, according to the Masarat Facebook page.

Instead, the organisers said at a press conference that was held following the cancellation decision that they began “receiving death threats following news of the cancellation of the conference”.

During the press conference held in front of the Writer’s Association’s headquarters in Jabal Luweibdeh, Qandil stressed that the content of the conference was “in accordance with our religious fundamentals and values while maintaining the right for the participants to express their opinions and thoughts in a scientific manner”, adding that it aimed “to allow thinkers and researchers to express their ideas and explore the religion in a manner that ensures the safety and security of all”.

Qandil charged then that the cancellation was part of “politicising the Islamic religion in Jordan in order to control our lives although the Islamic religion is supposed to encourage discussions and allow us to express our opinions freely”.

The Ifta Department had also issued a statement last week warning against organising conferences and events that would instigate sectarianism by holding religious events that could be misinterpreted as harming the religious fabric of the society.

The Ifta Department stressed that “it rejects any events that would tarnish all religions and would shake the security of the society, and in no way reflects accepted free speech but rather falls under the idea of attacking others and their values”.

Hundreds of activists took to social media to express their “rejection and anger” over the attack against Qandil describing it as an “attempt to silence the voice of reason”, and held the government accountable for what happened with Qandil.

Zaid Nabulsi, an attorney and activist, wrote in a post on his Facebook page that the primary responsibility for “the incitement that drives such acts rests with the government". 

“The government decided to ban an already licensed event organised by Qandil's organiastion on the flimsy pretext that one of the seminars in the conference had a blasphemous title — ‘insulting God’,” Nabulsi wrote.

Nabulsi added that the government, by publicly denouncing Qandil's organisation as “offensive to religion, has actually encouraged the hard line elements to portray themselves as protectors of God”.

Dalal Smreen added on Facebook: “This is shocking and sad news to hear today. The government should act firmly against individuals who are trying to silence anyone who promotes progressive and coexistent ideologies.”

Meanwhile, an outspoken member of the Muslim Brotherhood, Zaki Bani Irsheid condemned the attack on his Facebook page by describing the attack on Qandil as “cowardly and contradicts the religious rulings and societal values”.

“What happened to Qandil should [ cause people to] work towards calling for a national dialogue that adopts real comprehensive reform that guarantees freedoms and rights, and at the same time rejects terrorism and forced opinions and ideologies no matter where the source was from,” Bani Irsheid said.