New Delhi: According to new reports, India carried out an air strike that killed the entire family of Masood Azhar, the chief of the terror group Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM). As per the Pakistani media, the Indian Air Force attacked Azhar’s house in the early hours of Wednesday. The report says 14 of his family members died in the attack.
However, Masood Azhar has confirmed the death of only 10 family members. According to the report, the Indian Army carried out a strike at around 1.30 am at Masood Azhar’s house in Bahabalpur, located 100 km from the Indian border. In this strike, bombs were dropped on Masood’s hideout, where his entire family was sleeping.
The report said that as soon as the bomb fell, 14 members of the family were killed. However, Masood Azhar was not present at home at the time of the attack. Pakistani media reports stated that at the time of the strike, Masood Azhar’s elder sister, Maulana Kashaf’s entire family, Mufti Abdul Rauf’s grandson, elder daughter Shaheed Baji Sadiya were sleeping in the house with her husband and four children.
Masood Azhar has issued his statement after the attack. He said that the death of 10 people of the family has been confirmed so far. According to Masood, 5 children have been killed in the strike. Some women are also reported dead. Apart from this, Masood’s brother-in-law has also been killed in the strike.
Who is Masood Azhar?
Masood Azhar is the founder of Jaish-e-Mohammed, a banned terrorist group. Even though this group was officially banned in 2002, it still runs training camps and operates under protection in Pakistan. Azhar is known to live in Bahawalpur, inside a heavily guarded compound.
Azhar was born in Bahawalpur in 1968. In the past, he was part of another group called Harkat-ul-Mujahideen (HuM), which was active in Afghanistan. In 1994, he was arrested in India on terrorism charges. Later, he was released in a hostage exchange and went on to form Jaish-e-Mohammed in January 2000, in Karachi.
Since then, his group has been involved in major terror attacks in India, including the attack on the Jammu and Kashmir Assembly and the Parliament. JeM follows an extreme form of Deobandi Islamic thinking. The main base of JeM is located dangerously close to the 31 Corps headquarters of the Pakistan Army and is also near a suspected secret nuclear site in Bahawalpur.
In 2019, the United Nations declared Masood Azhar a global terrorist. Reports say he has been unwell lately, suffering from kidney problems, and has not appeared in public very often. The last time he was seen was at a wedding in June 2024.
Azhar’s brother, Abdul Rauf Azhar, along with senior members Shah Nawaz Khan and Maulana Mufti Mohammad Asghar, are believed to be in charge of training camps in different parts of Pakistan and Muzaffarabad. These camps are said to have over 300 recruits being trained.
Jaish-e-Mohammed, also known as the “Army of Muhammad,” continues to push a violent agenda. Their goal is to bring Kashmir under Pakistan’s control and rule it under strict Islamic law.
