An award-winning journalist and director of Community Media Network, Daoud Kuttab talked exclusively to Eurasia Diary.

A controversial political commentator and columnist, Hattar, 56, was shot dead near the Palace of Justice in Abdali, in central Amman. According to media reports, the assailant, who was wearing a traditional Arab dishdasha, or long robe, drew his weapon from the bag he was holding and shot Hattar at close range three times. Hattar was rushed to a nearby hospital, where he died. The suspected gunman, Riad Abdullah, was reportedly arrested at the scene. Security forces said he was a known extremist.

In the wake of Hattar’s killing, Amman-based IPI Executive Board Member and World Press Freedom Hero Daoud Kuttab exclusively talked  to Eurasia Diary that it showed that we need to change the current atmosphere in Jordan. "It's a clear case of intellectual terror. The omen is that many people are now going to be worried about what they say. It's a scary situation for people who believe in the freedom of thought and opinion and the right of expressing their opinion."

“The killer of Jordanian writer Nahed Hattar is not a single individual but a cultural environment that criminalises thought and easily appoints blasphemy accusations on thinkers.”

In an exclusive interview to Eurasia Diary, Mr. Kuttabt said  that to remedy this problem all community need to work hard on legitimising thought and ideas no matter whether we and our immediate community like them or not.