AMMAN (AFP) - The State Security Court on Thursday imposed jail sentences of 15 to 20 years on 12 Jordanian alleged Al Qaeda members accused of attacks against a church in the Kingdom last year, a court official said.

Five of the men, aged between 19 and 28, received the death penalty but the court commuted the sentence to 20 years in prison "because they are young and should be given a chance to repent", the official told AFP.

The other seven were handed 15-year sentences.

The defendants were charged in July 2008 with "carrying out terrorist attacks and manufacturing and using explosives".

"The Al Qaeda members tried to attack a Latin church in Irbid [in the north] in July last year after a Christian boy allegedly insulted the Prophet Mohammad, but the attempt failed," he said.

"Following that, they attacked the same church again using Molotov [cocktail bombs] and a Christian cemetery in Irbid, but caused no casualties."

In March, the State Security Court sentenced three Jordanians to twenty-two-and-a-half years in prison for plotting a suicide car bomb attack on a church in Amman last year.

They plotted to bomb a Roman Catholic Church in Amman's eastern district of Marka after initially planning to strike against a police battalion.