Kathy Kelly

Its economy gutted by war, Afghanistan’s largest cash crop remains opium. Yet farmers there do grow other crops for export. Villagers in the Wazir Tangi area of Nangarhar province, for example, cultivate pine nuts. As a precaution, this year at harvest time, village elders notified the governor of the province that they would be bringing … Continue reading “The Wounds of War in Afghanistan”

"I felt shaky and uneasy all day, preparing for this talk" – Jehad Abusalim, a Palestinian from the territory of Gaza Jehad Abusalim, a Palestinian now living in the United States, grew up in Gaza. In Chicago last week, addressing activists committed to breaking the siege of Gaza, he held up a stack of 31 … Continue reading “The Ongoing Dread in Gaza: So Many Names, So Many Lives”

Last week, Elham Pourtaher, an Iranian graduate student at the State University of New York in Albany, wrote about how US policies cause suffering and trauma far beyond US borders. Her diabetic father, for example, is in danger of losing access to medicines because sanctions against Iranian banks make it nearly impossible to pay for … Continue reading “An Honorable Course in Iran: End Sanctions, Resume Dialogue”

At 9:30 in the morning of March 26, the entrance to a rural hospital in northwest Yemen, supported by Save the Children, was teeming as patients waited to be seen and employees arrived at work. Suddenly, missiles from an airstrike hit the hospital, killing seven people, four of them children. Jason Lee of Save the … Continue reading “‘Every War Is a War Against Children’”

Chelsea Manning, who bravely exposed atrocities committed by the U.S. military, is again imprisoned in a US jail. On International Women’s Day, March 8, 2019, she was incarcerated in the Alexandria, VA federal detention center for refusing to testify in front of a secretive Grand Jury. Her imprisonment can extend through the term of the … Continue reading “Judging US War Crimes”

Twenty years ago, a small delegation organized by Voices in the Wilderness lived in Baghdad while U.S. cruise missiles attacked more than 100 targets in Iraq. Following four days of bombing, known as “Operation Desert Fox,” our group visited various Iraqis who had survived direct hits. One young girl handed me a large missile fragment, … Continue reading “A Shift: Repudiating War on Yemen”

Several days ago, I joined an unusual Skype call originated by young South Korean founders of "The Hope School." Located on Jeju Island, the school aims to build a supportive community between island residents and newly arrived Yemenis who seek asylum in South Korea. Jeju, a visa-free port, has been an entry point for close … Continue reading “Seeing Yemen From Jeju”

On August 9, a U.S.-supported Saudi airstrike bombed a bus carrying schoolchildren in Sa’ada, a city in northern Yemen. The New York Times reported that the students were on a recreational trip. According to the Sa’ada health department, the attack killed at least forty-three people. According to the International Committee of the Red Cross, at … Continue reading “US Is Complicit in Child Slaughter in Yemen”

"If they would just confirm to us that my brother is alive, if they would just let us see him, that’s all we want. But we can’t get anyone to give us any confirmation. My mother dies a hundred times every day. They don’t know what that is like." In July of 2018, an Amnesty … Continue reading “US Supports Saudi-UAE War Crimes in Yemen”

Writing this week for the Chicago Tribune, Steve Chapman called a U.S. Government report on the war in Afghanistan "a chronicle of futility." “The Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction” report says the US spent large sums "in search of quick gains" in regional stabilization – but these instead "exacerbated conflicts, enabled corruption and bolstered … Continue reading “On Purpose, In Kabul”