Jaish-e-Mohammad chief Masood Azhar on Wednesday claimed that 10 members of his family and four aides were killed in Indian strikes across Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir.
Past midnight on Tuesday, India struck nine terror camps linked to Jaish, Lashkar-e-Taiba and Hizbul Mujahideen in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.
The strikes on the Subhan Allah complex in Bahawalpur were one of the two significant ones as part of ‘Operation Sindoor’, India’s response to the Pahalgam attack in which terrorists killed 26 people, mostly tourists.
According to official information, those killed in Bahawalpur include Azhar’s elder sister and her husband, his nephew and his wife, another niece and five children of his family. JeM chief had issued a statement after they were killed.
The statement further said that a close aide of Azhar and his mother, and two other close associates were also killed in the Indian strikes.
Bahawalpur is the 12th largest city in Pakistan and is located 400 km from Lahore. The Subhan Allah camp, which houses the Jamia Masjid, has turned into rubble. Several footages have shown the widespread damage.
The camp is also known as the Usman-o-Ali campus, which serves as the JeM’s centre for recruitment, fundraising, and indoctrination. It is spread over 18 acres.
The JeM was founded by Azhar in 2000 and is behind multiple deadly attacks on Indian soil, including the 2001 Parliament, 2016 Pathankot and 2019 Pulwama attacks.
He was born in Bahawalpur and lives in a heavily-guarded complex.
Azhar was one of three terrorists that India released in exchange for passengers and crew on Indian Airlines Flight 814, the longest hostage crisis in India. The Delhi-bound plane from Kathmandu was flown to Amritsar, Lahore, Dubai and then to Kandahar in the then-Taliban-controlled Afghanistan in 1999.
The Indian strikes also hit Masjid wa Markaz Taiba in Muridke, another stronghold of JeM. The strikes killed around 30 terrorists each in Bahawalpur and Muridke. While officials are still confirming the number of terrorists killed at other locations, it is reported that between 70 and 80 were neutralised. The series of precision strikes lasted for 25 minutes, from 1.05 am to 1.30 am.
Quoting Pakistan, various reports give the number of dead in the airstrikes between 26 and 31.
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