Please Tell Me, Mr. President, Why a US Drone Assassinated My Mother

By Rafiq ur Rehman, Guardian UK

25 October 13

Momina Bibi was a 67-year-old grandmother and midwife from Waziristan. Yet President Obama tells us drones target terrorists

he last time I saw my mother, Momina Bibi, was the evening before Eid al-Adha. She was preparing my children's clothing and showing them how to make sewaiyaan, a traditional sweet made of milk. She always used to say: the joy of Eid is the excitement it brings to the children.

Last year, she never had that experience. The next day, 24 October 2012, she was dead, killed by a US drone that rained fire down upon her as she tended her garden.

Nobody has ever told me why my mother was targeted that day. The media reported that the attack was on a car, but there is no road alongside my mother's house. Several reported the attack was on a house. But the missiles hit a nearby field, not a house. All reported that five militants were killed. Only one person was killed - a 67-year-old grandmother of nine.

My three children - 13-year-old Zubair, nine-year-old Nabila and five-year-old Asma - were playing nearby when their grandmother was killed. All of them were injured and rushed to hospitals. Were these children the "militants" the news reports spoke of? Or perhaps, it was my brother's children? They, too, were there. They are aged three, seven, 12, 14, 15 and 17 years old. The eldest four had just returned from a day at school, not long before the missile struck.

But the United States and its citizens probably do not know this. No one ever asked us who was killed or injured that day. Not the United States or my own government. Nobody has come to investigate nor has anyone been held accountable. Quite simply, nobody seems to care.

I care, though. And so does my family and my community. We want to understand why a 67-year-old grandmother posed a threat to one of the most powerful countries in the world. We want to understand how nine children, some playing in the field, some just returned from school, could possibly have threatened the safety of those living a continent and an ocean away.

Most importantly, we want to understand why President Obama, when asked whom drones are killing, says they are killing terrorists. My mother was not a terrorist. My children are not terrorists. Nobody in our family is a terrorist.

My mother was a midwife, the only midwife in our village. She delivered hundreds of babies in our community. Now families have no one to help them.

And my father? He is a retired school principal. He spent his life educating children, something that my community needs far more than bombs. Bombs create only hatred in the hearts of people. And that hatred and anger breeds more terrorism. But education - education can help a country prosper.

I, too, am a teacher. I was teaching in my local primary school on the day my mother was killed. I came home to find not the joys of Eid, but my children in the hospital and a coffin containing only pieces of my mother.

Our family has not been the same since that drone strike. Our home has turned into hell. The small children scream in the night and cannot sleep. They cry until dawn.

Several of the children have had to have multiple surgeries. This has cost money we no longer have, since the missiles also killed our livestock. We have been forced to borrow from friends; money we cannot repay. We then use the money to pay a doctor, a doctor who removes from the children's bodies the metal gifts the US gave them that day.

Drone strikes are not like other battles where innocent people are accidentally killed. Drone strikes target people before they kill them. The United States decides to kill someone, a person they only know from a video. A person who is not given a chance to say - I am not a terrorist. The US chose to kill my mother.

Several US congressmen invited me to come to Washington, DC to share my story with members of Congress. I hope by telling my story, America may finally begin to understand the true impact of its drone program and who is on the other end of drone strikes.

I want Americans to know about my mother. And I hope, maybe, I might get an answer to just one question: why?

Editor's Note: Momina Bibi's age when she died was originally given in the body text and standfirst as 65; this was amended to 67 at 1.30pm (ET) on 25 October

Pepper Spray Cop's Settlement Sets Dangerous Precedent

By Carl Gibson, Reader Supported News

25 October 13

hen a man shoots a police officer, he's automatically labeled a cop killer, and reports describe it as a man murdering another man in uniform. But when cops shoot and kill innocent, unarmed black teens, like they've done in multiple cases over the years, it's always described as an "officer-involved shooting." The cop goes on paid leave until the outrage blows over, and is given a comfy desk job to keep him away from harm. If a man walked up to a group of college students and attacked them with chemical weapons without provocation, he would rightly be arrested and jailed for aggravated assault. But when a man with a badge and uniform does it, he gets a year's salary from the state for free.

Lt. John Pike of the UC Davis police pepper-sprayed a group of sitting protesters in 2011. Amidst an autumn of federally-coordinated, violent police suppression of the Occupy movement, the incident in Davis was clearly one of the most heinous cases. A group of students had linked arms, sat down, and refused to move when the police came to evict their encampment. Lt. John Pike then casually exhibited a red can of military-grade pepper spray, nonchalantly strolled past the protesters, and doused them in orange gas, which led to the hospitalization several of the students. International outrage ensued. "Pepper Spraying Cop" became a widely-shared meme, and Pike was originally put on paid leave and eventually fired. The students sued, and a $1 million settlement was split between all 21 of them. Pike was just awarded $38,058 in disability payments, after claiming he suffered "emotional and psychological damage" from his attack on UC Davis students.

This is the most egregious and ballsy defrauding of the state in years. If Pike had wanted to avoid suffering emotional and psychological damage, all he had to do was let protesters protest, instead of attacking them without provocation with chemical weapons licensed for military use. Instead, he claimed he was "damaged" from being loathed by the entire world, and the state gave him what amounts to an average annual salary for a professional-level job. Disability is money that's normally reserved for veterans who come home suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, factory workers who breathe in noxious fumes, or construction workers who throw their back out while on the job. Disability money should definitely not go to rent-a-cops who commit violent acts against peaceful protesters. Especially when that cop's overzealous act was proven to have been preventable by a task force who examined the incident.

Pike's settlement is dangerous, specifically because it sets a precedent allowing police to act egregiously, knowing they won't be held accountable and can be entitled to a hefty settlement after the fact. If Lt. Pike can get a sizable disability settlement, why can't other cops, like the ones who shot Kimani Gray, an unarmed black teenager in the Flatbush area of Brooklyn, just for how he looked? After riots broke out in Flatbush and the NYPD put the neighborhood under martial law, what's to stop Gray's shooters from pleading to the state of New York for the "emotional and psychological" damages stemming from their actions?

Part of the law enforcement oath taken by police everywhere is, "I will always have the courage to hold myself and others accountable for our actions." Not only did Pike fail to hold himself accountable, but UC Davis police chief Annette Spicuzza betrayed her oath when she defended Pike's actions in the media in the face of widespread international outrage, alleging that the students' act of sitting and linking arms justified using violent force. Spicuzza was finally placed on administrative leave when the outrage reached its peak. This isn't just a problem with one cop, but an entire police force. And the UC Davis Police's refusal to hold themselves accountable is a problem seen in almost every major city's police department. All the investigations of police brutality are handled internally, with police investigators from that same police department absolving all officers of guilt.

A civilian review board of police actions must go hand in hand with every municipal and university police force. This will ensure that if something like Lt. Pike's unprovoked attack on students happens again, there are a group of citizens with no ties to the police who will hold these cops accountable. Pike's settlement must not become a license for all crooked, violent, mentally-unstable cops to freely persecute citizens.

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Carl Gibson, 26, is co-founder of US Uncut, a nationwide creative direct-action movement that mobilized tens of thousands of activists against corporate tax avoidance and budget cuts in the months leading up to the Occupy Wall Street movement. Carl and other US Uncut activists are featured in the documentary "We're Not Broke," which premiered at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival. He currently lives in Madison, Wisconsin. You can contact him at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it , and follow him on twitter at @uncutCG.

Reader Supported News is the Publication of Origin for this work. Permission to republish is freely granted with credit and a link back to Reader Supported News.