^[1] KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN: Members of the Zhari district Shura told me that on April 27, 2009, around 2:00 o’clock in the morning, a group of U.S. soldiers stormed the village of Sulaghai, killing 11 people and taking away two others.

The district elders added that later that day, sometime between 6:00 and 8:00 o’clock in the morning, fighter jets bombarded the village, destroying a tractor that was stationed outside the house of the family that had been the target of the raid. This time no one was killed but a teenage girl was injured, and her family and neighbors had to bring her to Mirwais Hospital in Kandahar.

According to several members of the district Shura, who asked me not to reveal their names for security reasons, a crowd of furious villagers carried the dead bodies of the victims of the night raid to the headquarters of Zhari district, demanding justice and retribution. The villagers swore that the culprits were U.S. soldiers.

Most of the dead belonged to the Popalzai clan, and therefore the district elders informed their regional leader, Ahmed Wali Karzai, and asked him to stop these actions by the U.S. military.

This was not a new incident for us residents of southern Afghanistan. U.S. and NATO forces often kill civilians. But what really surprised me in this case was that at the time of this incident I called several TV and radio stations so that they would tell this story to the world, and they said they could not cover it unless an American or an Afghan official recognized its truthfulness.

I have not been to Sulaghai myself, but I know people who are from there, and I know that the elders spoke the truth. As a resident of Kandahar, I would take their word over the word of a government official—anytime.