JeM was allegedly created with the support of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI),[4][27][28] which is using it to carry out terrorist attacks in Kashmir and rest of India.[29][30] Due to sustained international pressure against Pakistan sponsored terrorism, JeM was banned in Pakistan in 2002 as a formality. However, the organization was never seriously disrupted or dismantled.[31] Its arrested leaders were subsequently released without any charges and permitted to re-form under new names.[32][33] Its variants openly continue operations under different names or charities in several facilities in Pakistan.[34][35]
In 2016, JeM was suspected of being responsible for an attack on the Pathankot airbase in India. The Indian government,[41] and some other sources, accused Pakistan of assisting JeM in conducting the attack.[29][30] Pakistan denied assisting JeM, and arrested several members of JeM in connection with the attack,[42] who were then released by the security establishment according to a report in Dawn.[43] Pakistan called the report an "amalgamation of fiction and fabrication".[44] In February 2019, the group took responsibility for a suicide bombing attack on a security convoy in the Pulwama district that killed 40 security personnel, named as one of the largest attacks in recent years.[45][46]
In April 2025, a terrorist attack in Baisaran Valley near Pahalgam, Jammu and Kashmir, resulted in the deaths of 26 civilians, primarily Hindu tourists. The Resistance Front (TRF), believed to be an offshoot of the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), initially claimed responsibility for the attack but later retracted the claim. Indian authorities implicated JeM in the attack, citing evidence linking the group to the assailants. The incident led to heightened tensions between India and Pakistan, with India launching "Operation Sindoor," targeting terror-linked sites in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.[47] Subsequent encounters in the region resulted in the killing of several militants associated with JeM and TRF.[48]
^ abMoj, Deoband Madrassah Movement (2015), p. 98: "Deobandis like Masood Azhar, a graduate of Jamia Binouria who later set up a jihadist outfit named Jaish-e-Muhammad (JeM) in 2000, reportedly at the behest of Pakistan's military establishment."
^ abRiedel, Deadly Embrace (2012): "The answer is JeM's friend and ally, Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda." (p. 69) "Or as Pakistan's interior minister Rehman Malik has put it, "They—Lashkar-e-Janghvi, the Sipah-e-Sohaba Pakistan, and Jaish-e-Mohammad—are allies of the Taliban and al Qaeda" and do indeed pursue many of the same goals." (p. 100)
^ ab"Currently listed entities". Public Safety Canada. Government of Canada. 21 December 2018. Archived from the original on 28 July 2021. Retrieved 13 August 2021.
^Jaffrelot, The Pakistan Paradox (2015), p. 520: "as soon as he was freed, Masood Azhar was back in Pakistan where he founded a new jihadist movement, Jaish-e-Mohammed, which became one of the jihadist groups the ISI used in Kashmir and elsewhere."
^Moj, Deoband Madrassah Movement (2015), p. 98: "In addition to guerilla activities in Kashmir, JeM kept close ties with the Taliban as well as al-Qaeda in Afghanistan."
^Rashid, Descent into Chaos (2012), Glossary: "Jaish-e-Mohammed— ... militant group... formed in 2000 by the ISI and Maulana Masud Azhar in the aftermath of the hijacking of an Air India plane to Kandahar."
^Riedel, Deadly Embrace (2012), p. 70: "But the ban was only a formality; neither organization [LeT and JeM] was seriously disrupted or dismantled. Hardly touched by the crackdown, LeT was spared the most."
^Majidyar, Could Taliban take over Punjab? (2010), p. 3: "Pakistani jails have revolving doors, and even high-profile detainees like JeM leader Maulana Masood Azhar and LeT chief Hafiz Muhammad Saeed were soon free men. Banned organizations resurfaced under new names or as charities..."
^Gregory, The ISI and the War on Terrorism (2007), pp. 1022–1023: "However, most of those arrested were subsequently released without any charges and the separatist/Islamic Jihadis groups, such as the ISI creations Lashkar-e-Toiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed, have been permitted to re-form, some of them under different names."
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