In Sympathy for

Hafeeza, 35, exiled

Nafisa, her sister, exiled

Ten children, exiled

fled Kabul in the morning of October 8, 2001

As soon as the U.S-British bombing of Kabul stopped at 4 A.M., Hafeeza, her sister, and 10 of their 12 children decided to flee their home located near the Kabul airport. They crammed into a minibus headed towards Pakistan. The 8-hour journey left them near the border where they hired a guide along with five other families. He led them along a precipitous mountain path across the border. Hefeeza called, “we all fell and cut ourselves. It was very hard walking, but we made it.” Clutching small bags of belongings, the two women left little behind as they made their way to Peshawar. Hafeeza lost her husband in 1996, an air force pilot, who was taken away by the Taliban and never returned.

Fleeing the “…very big and very dangerous” U.S. bombs