Hafiz Saeed

A major early influence on his life and ideology was his maternal uncle, and later father-in-law, Hafiz Abdullah Bahawalpuri, who was a famed theologian belonging to the Ahl-i Hadith, a Wahhabi group considered the most extreme in its theological positions, who held that democracy was incompatible with Islam (which alienated him with Maulana Maududi's Jamaat-e-Islami) and argued, on the importance of jihad, "that only in jihad does one offer one’s life in the way of Allah, which elevates it to a higher plane than merely fulfilling other religious responsibilities such as saying prayers and paying zakat, also entailing sacrifices and adjustments, but not at the scale evident in jihad" and "considered shahadat (martyrdom) to be the crux of jihad." Bahawalpuri's only son, Abdul Rehman Makki, is Saeed's brother-in-law and has been described as "his close partner."

Saeed's son Talha Saeed serves as the Lashkar-e-Taiba second-in-command. He controls the finances of Lashkar. In 2019, Talha escaped an assassination attempt when a bomb inside a refrigerator shop exploded in Lahore. According to Lashkar the bombing was attributed to the infighting in the Lashkar and RAW.

On 3 July 2019, 23 cases related to terror financing and money laundering under the Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA), 1997 were registered by Counter Terrorism Department (CTD) of Pakistan. According to CTD, JuD was financing terrorism from the funds collected by several non-profit organisations and trusts that included Al-Anfaal Trust, Dawatul Irshad Trust, Muaz Bin Jabal Trust, etc. CTD had banned these non-profit organisations in April 2019. On further investigations, CTD had found that these organisations were linked with JuD and were in touch with the top leadership of JuD.

On 17 July, Saeed was arrested in Gujranwala by the Punjab CTD on the charges of terror financing. He was subsequently sent to the prison on judicial remand by a Gujranwala Anti Terrorism Court (ATC). On 27 September 2019, during the United Nations General Assembly, USA asked Pakistan to prosecute Saeed, Masood Azhar and other UN-designated terrorists. On 30 November 2019, the Government of Pakistan stated that they will prosecute Saeed. On 11 December 2019, he was indicted by the ATC in the charges of terror financing in several cities of Punjab province of Pakistan. As on December 2019, Saeed resides in the Kot Lakhpat jail also known as Central Jail Lahore.He was convicted for five years by a Pakistan court for financing terrorism, in February 2020.

The United States declared two Lashkar-e-Tayyiba leaders—Nazir Ahmad Chaudhry and Muhammad Hussein Gill—specially designated global terrorists. The State Department also maintained LeT's designation as a Foreign Terrorist Organisation and added the following aliases to its listing of LeT: Jama’at-ud-Dawa, Al-Anfal Trust, Tehrik-i-Hurmat-i-Rasool, and Tehrik-i-Tahafuz Qibla Awwal. The Department of Treasury said that LeT was responsible for the November 2008 terrorist attack in Mumbai which killed nearly 200 people. The group's leader is Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, who is listed under UN Security Council Resolution 1267.

In September 2014, Saeed accused India of "water terrorism". Though there was flood crisis in India too, Saeed blamed India for flood crisis in Pakistan. In several tweets on social media he said, "Indian gov discharged water in rivers without notification & has given false information; an act of open mischief," "India has used water to attack Pakistan, We are in state of War. India's water aggression must be taken to the UN security council."

In January 2013, India's then Union Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde released a statement on the alleged existence of Hindu terrorism as well as the existence of Hindu terror camps on Indian soil, being run and organised by the BJP and the RSS. As a result, Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jamaat-ud-Dawa welcomed Shinde's statements and congratulated him for admitting the existence of Hindu terrorism. Hafiz Saeed demanded that the United States take serious notice of this statement by the Indian home minister regarding Hindu terrorist camps in India. "The US should now carry out drone attacks on these terror camps in India," Saeed said.

Responding to a question about the nuclear warning issued by Indian authorities in Jammu and Kashmir after the 2013 India–Pakistan border incidents, Saeed said that in case of a nuclear war between India and Pakistan, India should distribute nuclear safety pamphlets in Delhi, Mumbai and Calcutta rather than in Kashmir.

In April 2012, the United States announced a bounty of US$10 million on Hafeez Saeed, for his role in the 2008 Mumbai attacks. Saeed stated that he had nothing to do with the Mumbai attacks and condemned them. When asked about the bounty, Saeed replied, "I am living my life in the open and the US can contact me whenever they want." He subsequently stated that he was ready to face "any American court" to answer the charges and added that if Washington wanted to contact him, they knew where he was. "This is a laughable, absurd announcement. Here I am in front of everyone, not hiding in a cave," he said in a press conference. Saeed identified his leading role in the Difa-e-Pakistan Council and US attempts to placate India as reasons behind the bounty.

On 11 May 2011, in an effort to place pressure on Pakistan, India publicly revealed a list of its 50 most wanted fugitives hiding in Pakistan. India believes Hafiz Saeed is a fugitive, but the Indian arrest warrant had no influence in Pakistan and presently has no effect on Saeed's movements within Pakistan. Following the Lahore High Court ruling, Saeed has been moving freely around the country. For many years, India has demanded that Saeed be handed over but there is no extradition treaty between the two countries.

On 6 July 2009, the Pakistani government filed an appeal of the court's decision. Deputy Attorney General Shah Khawar told the Associated Press that "Hafiz Saeed at liberty is a security threat."

On 25 August 2009, Interpol issued a red notice against Hafiz Saeed, along with Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi, in response to Indian requests for his extradition.

Hafiz Muhammad Saeed was again placed under house arrest by the Pakistani authorities in September 2009.

On 12 October 2009, the Lahore High Court quashed all cases against Hafiz Muhammad Saeed and set him free. The court also notified that Jama'at-ud-Da'wah is not a banned organisation and can work freely in Pakistan. Justice Asif Saeed Khosa, one of two judges hearing the case, observed "In the name of terrorism we cannot brutalise the law."

After the November 2008 Mumbai attacks, India submitted a formal request to the U.N. Security Council to put the group Jamaat-ud-Dawa and Hafiz Muhammad Saeed on the list of individuals and organisations sanctioned by the United Nations for association with terrorism. India has accused the organisation and its leader, Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, of being virtually interchangeable with Lashkar-e-Taiba. India said that the close links between the organisations, as well as the 2,500 offices and 11 seminaries that Jamaat-ud-Dawa maintains in Pakistan, "are of immediate concern with regard to their efforts to mobilise and orchestrate terrorist activities." On 10 December 2008, Hafiz Muhammad Saeed denied a link between LeT and JuD in an interview with Pakistan's Geo television stating that "no Lashkar-e-Taiba man is in Jamaat-ud-Dawa and I have never been a chief of Lashkar-e-Taiba."

On 11 December 2008, Hafiz Muhammed Saeed was again placed under house arrest when the United Nations declared Jamaat-ud-Dawa to be an LeT front. Hafiz Muhammad Saeed was held in house arrest under the Maintenance of Public Order law, which allows authorities to detain temporarily individuals deemed likely to create disorder, until early June 2009 when the Lahore High Court, deeming the containment to be unconstitutional, ordered Hafiz Muhammad Saeed to be released. India quickly expressed its disappointment with the decision.

After 11 July 2006 Mumbai train bombings, the provincial government of Punjab, Pakistan arrested him on 9 August 2006 and kept him under house arrest but he was released on 28 August 2006 after a Lahore High Court order. He was arrested again on the same day by the provincial government and was kept in the Canal Rest House in Sheikhupura. He was finally released after the Lahore High Court order on 17 October 2006.

Pakistan took Saeed into custody on 21 December 2001 due to an Indian government assertion that he was involved in 13 December 2001 attack on the Lok Sabha. He was held until 31 March 2002, released, then taken back into custody on 15 May. He was placed under house arrest on 31 October 2002 after his wife Maimoona Saeed sued the province of Punjab and the Pakistan federal government for what she claimed was an illegal detention.

In 1994, Saeed visited the United States and "spoke at Islamic centres in Houston, Chicago and Boston".

This organisation spawned the jihadist group Lashkar-e-Taiba in 1990, with the help of Pakistan's Inter Services Intelligence officers.

In 1987, Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, along with Abdullah Azzam, founded Markaz Dawa-Wal-Irshad, a group with roots in the Jamiat Ahl-e-Hadis.

General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq appointed Hafiz Muhammad Saeed to the Council on Islamic Ideology, and he later served as an Islamic Studies teacher at the University of Engineering and Technology, Pakistan. He was sent to Saudi Arabia in the early 1980s by the university for higher studies where he met Saudi sheikhs who were taking part in the Soviet–Afghan War. They inspired him in taking an active role supporting the mujahideen in Afghanistan. During his studies at the King Saud University, where he was gold medalist for his academic performances as well as taught there, he came under the influence of Salafi scholars like Shaykh Muhammad ibn al Uthaymeen and especially Shaykh Ibn Baz.

Hafiz Muhammad Saeed (Urdu: حافظ محمد سعید ‎, born 5 June 1950) is a Pakistani Islamist militant, who is a co-founder of Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and the chief of Jama'at-ud-Da'wah (JuD), operating mainly from Pakistan. In April 2012, the United States announced a bounty of $10 million on Saeed for his alleged role in the 2008 Mumbai attacks that killed 164 civilians. While India supported the US move, there were protests against it in Pakistan.

Hafiz Muhammad Saeed was born in a family of Sargodha, Punjab. As told by him, his father, Kamal-ud-Din, a farmer, along with his family started migrating from East Punjab and reached Pakistan in around four months in the autumn of 1947. His family lost 36 of its members when migrating from Hisar, Haryana (erstwhile Punjab) to Lahore during the partition of India.