Jaish-e-Mohammad chief Maulana Masood Azhar has claimed that 10 members of his family and four of his aides were killed in India’s targeted airstrikes under Operation Sindoor to avenge the Pahalgam terror attack.
A statement attributed to Azhar, who was arrested in India in 1994 and released after the Air India IC 814 hijack, says that those killed in the strike on JeM headquarters — Jamia Masjid Subhan Allah in Bahawalpur — included his elder sister, her husband, a nephew and his wife, a niece, and five children from the extended family.
“Ten members of my family were blessed with this happiness together tonight… five are innocent children, my elder sister, her honorable husband. My scholar Fazil bhanje (nephew) and his wife and my beloved scholar Fazilah (niece) … my dear brother Huzaifah and his mother. Two more dear companions,” he said, saying that those killed have become the guests of Allah.
He said he has “neither regret nor despair”. “Rather, it comes to my heart again and again that I too would have joined this fourteen-member happy caravan,” he added. The terrorist said, “Time for their departure had come, but the Lord did not kill them.”
