Afghan siblings, wounded in Kabul airport bombing, seek new life in Northern Virginia

Afghan girl looks at camera

by Antonio Olivio for the Washington Post

Mina Stanekzai, 8, strapped on a princess backpack, slipped on her pink shoes that light up when she walks, and — her leg still injured from a suicide bomb — bounced out of her aunt’s Northern Virginia apartment for her first day of school in America.

“How are you?” she said with a heavy Dari accent, practicing some English that might impress her teachers while her aunt, Ferishta Stanekzai, drove to her new school.

“I am fine,” Mina answered herself.

It was a simple American pleasantry for a girl whose life was anything but. Mina is one of the hundreds of Afghans who have settled into the Washington region as part of an airlift out of Afghanistan that launched the greatest influx of refugees the United States has seen since the end of the Vietnam War.

Click Here to Read the Full Story

Categories: 

More Stories

Sixty-Three Years Ago

Peace on Earth
October 11, 2025
Sixty-three Years Ago Fr. Frederick Edlefsen Pope Leo XIV asked us to pray a daily rosary in October for peace. His timing is...Read more

Bringing Peace into our Culture and our World

October 7, 2025

By Father Fred Edlefsen

Pope Leo XIV asks everyone to say a daily rosary in October for world peace...Read more

Pope Leo XIV: Pray a Daily Rosary for Peace in October

October 1, 2025

By Father Fred Edlefsen

The Catholic Church has traditionally dedicated October to praying the rosary. "I invite everyone to...Read more
Subscribe to Blog
  •  
  • 1 of 59