LeT co-founder Amir Hamza severely injured; admitted to Lahore hospital: Reports

Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) co-founder Amir Hamza has been "criticially hurt" and admitted in hospital on Tuesday (May 20), said news reports.

The 66-year-old editor of the magazines of LeT was critically injured in his house after an 'accident', and had to be admitted to a military hospital in Lahore under ISI's security cover.

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Who is Amir Hamza?

Amir Hamza is a veteran of the Afghan mujahideen and has long been described as a key ideologue of LeT.

He was once the editor of LeT’s official publication and has authored several books, including Qafila Da'wat aur Shahadat in 2002 (Caravan of Proselytising and Martydom).

Also read: LeT terrorist Razaullah Nizamani killed by unidentified gunmen in Sindh

The United States Treasury Department has designated LeT as a terrorist organisation and lists Amir Hamza as a sanctioned terrorist. He was quite close to Hafiz Saeed, founder of the LeT terror outfit and Abdul Rehman Makki, both UN-designated terrorists.

In 2018, following financial crackdowns on LeT-affiliated charities Jamaat-ud-Dawah and Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation by Pakistani authorities, Hamza reportedly distanced himself from Lashkar.

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Subsequently, he founded a new splinter group named Jaish-e-Manqafa, allegedly to continue militant operations, including new insurgency missions and attacks in Jammu and Kashmir.

Saifullah gunned down

This incident comes after Razaullah Nizamani Khalid alias Abu Saifullah Khalid, a high-ranking Lashkar operative was gunned down by unidentified gunmen in the Sindh province of Pakistan on Sunday (May 18).

Saifullah was a similarly high-ranking operative, heading the terror operations of Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) from Nepal in the early 2000s and had many other aliases including Vinode Kumar, Mohammed Salim and Razaullah. He was involved in several terror strikes conducted by the Lashkar group in India.

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“He left his residence at Matli this afternoon and was gunned down by assailants near a crossing at Badni in Sindh province,” officials in New Delhi said.

Several attacks on India

A close associate of Abu Anas of LeT's leadership, Saifullah was the mastermind of the attack on the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) headquarters at Nagpur in 2006, in which all three terrorists were shot dead.

He was also the mastermind of the 2008 attack on a CRPF camp at Rampur in Uttar Pradesh in which seven personnel and a civilian were killed.

Khalid was tasked by the LeT and JuD leadership in Pakistan to undertake the recruitment of fresh cadres from the areas of Badin and Hyderabad districts of Sindh and collect funds for the organisation, as he worked closely with several leaders of LeT and Jamaat-ud-Dawah including Muzammil Iqbal Hashmi and Muhammad Yusuf Taibi.

Also read: Who is Hafiz Abdul Rauf, the man who led funeral of terrorists killed in Op Sindoor?

IISc Bangalore attack

Both Hamza and Saifullah were linked and part of the group that was behind the 2005 attack on the IISc in Bengaluru, in which IIT professor Munish Chandra Puri was killed and four others were injured.

Terror sympathisers on pro-Lashkar telegram channels were stunned on Tuesday evening, but asked LeT members to stay strong during this ‘crisis’, saying that this was a one-time accident.