Hello, I run Everything Afghanistan blog. I’ve decided to share my story of the NATO & US night raid to our home. (click on the images for bigger version)
On 19th November 2009, at 3:15 am , NATO Forces suddenly broke into our home and made the main gate blast with explosive , Fired at poor salesman Hamdullah ,one of my cousins who was staying the night with us and at day time doing his business.
Hamdullah , wounded by firing ,managed to escape back to his sleeping room from where he picked up his mobile phone to call our family members to inform them about the incident , another of our guests(a close relative of me), Muhammad Azim who had come to Bazaar to seek medication for his Hepatitis B disease, woke up and wanted to run towards Hamdullah to give him necessary help. As soon as he stood up from his bed , he was shot in the chest, which injured him. After the two were injured , the kids staying in the nearby room were too afraid to come out to their help, so they lay calm and terrorized .
Rahmatullah a 14 years old boy who was in the same room says, “i heard hamdullah calling he was wounded and needed help but I was too afraid to raise from my bed“
the troops then went to our living rooms , arrested Habiburahman , one of my cousins and an employee of the Afghan computer science association , who ,after completion of the Microsoft Localization Project , was desperately looking for a job. Inside our house, they left their dogs open to screen every single room for possible threats..The dogs terrorized every one and attacked & bite one of my aunts which caused a serious injury to her hand.
At home, they broke every window to terrorize the dwellers , broke every cabinet and briefcases to find evidence, and threw every book out of the cupboards , including the Quran so that there is nothing behind them.
After arresting my brother Habiburahman , they came back to our guest’s rooms where they ordered everyone to get out, The teenage kids, who had survived from the firing aimed at the windows of the rooms -came out , and were strictly checked and their hands tied ,were ordered to lay down in the muddy yard.
the injured guests( our relatives) had lost their strength to come out of the rooms, The troops then entered the rooms and fired tens of bullets at their heads, and bodies. My cousin’s head was the smashed with the back of their gun.
One of the kids ,Sadiqullah a 16 year old boy , was also arrested and dragged bare footed towards the helicopters which were landed 2 kilometers away! he says from the openings of his mask he could see habiburahman’s feet bleeding …as he was also barefooted .. and says he saw Troops firing at a 10 year old boy and his father in the street .. he further says that the troops continued to torture them until they reached the prison.
In the morning ,local police commissioner “Khyal Baz Sherzai “ along with PRT officials came for investigation. after checking and seeing everything, they said they knew nothing about the operation, and that it was directed from Bagram American Base. Mr.Shair Zai ordered his men to check whether the books torn apart were authentic Islamic books, because he doubted his friends would do such actions against afghan.
This news was covered by Al-Jazeera and some local channels and radios .Ariana T.V’s reporters captured the most thrilling and shocking pictures of the incident but didn’t show it, more over the T.V quoted from “Khyal bazz” that Ghazni Provence is totally at peace and that there is no news worth mentioning …
This is what happens every day in Afghanistan , and it is how suspected terrorists are arrested and their families and villages are terrorized.
Since two years , the U.S pattern of arresting suspects is the same , They go to the suspects location ,arrest the suspect and kill two or three civilians so that they are properly terrorized.
My cousins had to wash the blood from the carpets, walls and the ceilings while the kids watched. For months everyone in the house was very scared no one could sleep at night. The most tragic thing was the killing of my innocent cousin, he has no one to look after his 7 children except his mother.
They still have my Brother in Bagram prison, since then they have held several trials for him but always fail to convict him with any charges. They don’t have evidence against him in being involved in any sort of suspicious actions. He is in Fact so brilliant and well educated that the US officials in Bagram offered him many jobs to work for them in their bases in Afghanistan. But my brother refuse every time. How can one accept that after being tortured dragged out of home and have your cousins killed in cold blood. If he was really some one involved with Talibans, would they offer him jobs to work for them? would they keep suspending his trials without any success?. Its all lies and thousands of others are imprisoned in such manner with no evidence whatsoever. They just take people from their home without any proof.
Here is the Al-jazeera video to watch covering the day after the raid
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_UJ9BCkzKc