In a split second, hearts stopped beating. On September 30, as the day dawned crisp and clear, while students were taking a mock exam, two suicide bombers attacked the Kaaj Educational Center in Dasht-e Barchi, Kabul. The attackers killed the guards, entered the classroom, shot students, and one of them exploded himself. At least 53 innocent lives, mainly females, died, and dozens were injured.
The lives of the wounded ones changed forever.
“The doctors removed my left eye,” Fatima laments her fate. The attack on Kaaj took 17-years-old Fatima’s left eye, injured her hands and jaw, and raptured her eardrums. This happened when Fatima began a beautiful morning, excited to take the Kankor practice exam – an entrance exam for universities in Afghanistan. Little did she know that blood will fill in the answers. Fearing for their lives, her classmates burst into tears after hearing the shots. As a Hazara girl, Fatima always feared this moment.
Hazaras, a Shia Muslim ethnicity, the most peace-loving and supporting ethnicity have been the very primary target during any regime and political era for the sack of their ethnic affiliation and school of thought.
Fatima hid under a table, and the gunman exploded himself. The classroom darkened, and so did Fatima’s world. “I thought I was dead until I smelled my hair burning.” With blood all over her body, she still thought it was beautiful to be alive. Fatima jumped over the wall into the street and screamed for help. Eventually, she made it to the hospital but was worried for her friends. Her family assured her that they were fine. “They were not; they had died,” Fatima cries. Their dreams are buried, but Fatima does not let the pain crush hers. With one eye and a heavy heart, she recently took the Kankor exam and got accepted to study Computer Science. Fatima cannot afford to see the world with two eyes anymore. The doctors in Afghanistan cannot perform her eye operation, and traveling outside the country is expensive.
Fatima is not the only Hazara who got hurt while striving for knowledge. Terrorists are increasing their attacks on Hazaras in educational centers.
cording to the Hazara Inquiry report, the total number of casualties from attacks on educational centers in the Hazara neighborhood is approximately 775, with 346 killed and 429 injured. For some of the attacks, ISKP (Islamic State-Khorasan Province), ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria), and the Taliban took responsibility, while for some, no one has taken responsibility.
Many other Hazara students’ dark memories jogged after the attack on Kaaj.
“I lost my cousin, my best friend, and my other half, ” Gulamiz sobs. Malaka, a 19-years-old girl, was injured in an attack on the Kawsar-e Danish educational center that killed 30 people. After being in a coma for six days, she died. One night before the incident, Malaka and Gulamiz had a conversation about the security of students. Malaka was willing to risk her life for knowledge. Since nobody heard of Hazaras, she believed that only through education could she let the world know of their existence.
In the face of Hazara killings, the then-Afghan governments and all other states remained silent. In his article, Relentless Atrocities: The Persecution of Hazaras, Mehdi J. Hakimi claims that even when Afghanistan ratified the Rome Statute, the situation of Hazaras did not improve.
Malaka’s dreams only remained as words on pages of a bloodied notebook. She was waiting for the Kankor exam, but death was waiting for her. Malaka’s death broke Gulamiz, and the memories of that day still haunt her. “I saw naked bodies, bloodied notebooks, hands, legs, and heads,” Gulamiz trembles. The depression kept her indoors for months. But her late cousin’s dreams inspired her to move on. She is living Malaka’s dreams to sense her existence. Gulamiz is now studying international relations at Mount Holyoke College in Massachusetts, Boston. “No one sees me as a Hazara here; they see me as a human,” Gulamiz breathes heavily. After moving to the US, she realized how differently they treated her in Afghanistan.
As stated by Hakimi, Hazaras in Afghanistan cannot freely exercise their fundamental rights, such as the right to education and freedom of religion. According to the Hazara Inquiry report, the first massacre against Hazaras occurred in the nineteenth century, when the Afghan king Abdur Rahman Khan labeled them as infidels. Roughly 60% of Hazaras were killed, enslaved, and forced to migrate. Also, during Afghanistan’s civil war in the twentieth century, they faced social, economic, and political discrimination. Persecutions continue to this day, and now under the Taliban, they fear the most.
21-years-old Mursal, another Hazara girl, recalls her dark memories. In an attack on Mawoud educational center, now known as Kaaj, Mursal’s legs were injured. Her best friends died too. After the attack, Mursal could not walk for days, and it took her a year to sit in a classroom again. “Bricks fell on my back, but the burning books captured my eyes.” Her best friends would still be alive if it had not been for education. But Mursal now loves education more than ever and is studying Environmental Studies at the American University of Central Asia. Mursal calls herself a victim because the memories torment her to date. “The saddest part is that families could not recognize their children; the explosion either burnt them or cut off their heads,” Mursal shivers.
Besides educational centers, Hazaras are targeted in hospitals, workplaces, and worship places. From 2010 to 2022, a group of Hazara advocates have recorded 3836 casualties: 1537 killed and 2299 injured.
In April 2022, the UK parliamentarians launched an inquiry into the atrocities perpetrated against Hazaras in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Their first report writes that Hazaras face genocide as a religious and ethnic minority at the hands of the Taliban and the ISKP. Under the UN Genocide Convention and customary international law, the findings commit all states to protect Hazaras and prevent a possible genocide.
“How many more Hazara lives will it take for the world to call it a genocide,” Gulamiz wonders.
Story Narrated by Zuhal Qaderdan
