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

What is the Holy Spirit’s Gift of Understanding?

July 15, 2025

By Father Fred Edlefsen

In my previous article, "What are the Gifts of the Holy Spirit About?," I wrote that the...Read more

What are the Gifts of the Holy Spirit About?

July 9, 2025

By Father Fred Edlefsen

As we enter Ordinary Time – the Season after Pentecost – I will write a...Read more

What is the Holy Spirit’s Gift of Wisdom?

July 5, 2025

By Father Fred Edlefsen

The Holy Spirit’s Gifts are supernatural yet subtle “dispositions” given at Baptism and more deeply...Read more
Subscribe to Blog
  •  
  • 1 of 55