They tried to kill him in May 2025. He survived.
They tried again in April 2026. This time, unidentified gunman opened fire on wanted terrorist and Lashkar-e-Taiba founding member Amir Hamza in Pakistan's Lahore outside a TV station.
Reports said Hamza, 67, was rushed to hospital with critical injuries.
Who is Hamza
An idealogue, author, and terrorist linked to multiple attacks on India, including on the Indian Institute of Science in Bengaluru in 2005 that killed a professor and injured four others.
Hamza was born May 10, 1969, in Gujranwala in Pakistan's Punjab province.
A veteran of the Soviet-Afghan War, his induction into the murky world of terrorism was in 1984 at the hands of Zaki-ur Rehman Lakhvi when he was scouring Pakistan looking for fighters.
At the time Hamza was a student of the 'hadith', i.e., the recorded sayings and actions of the Prophet and which is seen as the second most important source of Islamic law.
In fact, according to US-based think tank Jamestown, Lakhvi introduced Hamza and Hafiz Saeed - another terrorist high on India's most-wanted list - Hafiz Saeed - to each other.
And the three, with three others, co-founded the Lashkar sometime in 1985-86.
Since then, the group - recognised as LeT and labelled a terrorist organisation by the United States in December 2001 and by the United Nations in May 2008 - has launched multiple terror attacks against India, including the April 2025 shooting in Jammu and Kashmir's Pahalgam.
READ | Laskhar Co-Founder, Behind India Terror Attacks, Shot In Lahore
The Pahalgam attack - in which 27 people, mostly civilians - were gunned down was carried out by a LeT proxy, i.e., The Resistance Front. The LeT itself, however, has been directly involved in several other horrific attacks on India, including one on an Army base in J&K's Uri in 2016.
Although Hamza formed his own group, the Jaish-e-Manqafa, in 2018, he remains a senior figure within the Lashkar; most accounts list him as the second-in-command after Saeed.
His Jaish-e-Manqafa operates as a critical fund-raising front for the Lashkar and its proxies, including the now-banned Jamat-ud-Dawa and Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation, and allows the LeT to remain financially viable despite a raft of sanctions imposed by the US and UN.
And leaning on his theology and academic background, which he wed to a fiery oratorial style, Hamza also became key in shaping the Lashkar's propaganda and outreach campaigns.
He edited the group's weekly newspaper and wrote several books, including Qafila Da'wat aur Shahadat (Caravan of Proselytising and Martydom) in 2022.
But his role as a logistics man was also critical, which led to him playing a key role in setting up Lashkar terrorist cells and bases across India in the early 2000s, The Times of India said.
