Word: sabari
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...friendly gesture. So that's what I did." To make sure the message was clear, Gulab lifted his tunic to show the American he wasn't hiding a weapon. He then propped up the wounded commando, and together the pair hobbled down the steep mountain trail to Sabari-Minah, a cluster of adobe-and-wood homes--crossing, for the time being, to safety...
After taking the SEAL to Sabari-Minah, Gulab called a village council and explained that the American needed protection from Taliban hunters. It was the SEAL's good fortune that the villagers were Pashtun, who are honor-bound never to refuse sanctuary to a stranger. By then, said Gulab, "the American understood that we were trying to save him, and he relaxed...
...they'd been fighting were not al-Qaeda or Taliban fighters but residents of Bhalkhel village. During the gun battle, they'd killed at least two villagers. But worse was to come. Two kilometers away, on a ridge on the other side of the valley, about 40 tribesmen from Sabari village were taking cover for the night in a series of bunkers hidden among wild olives and holly trees. They were guarding their homes, as they did every night, from their rivals in Bhalkhel, with whom they had been feuding for months over rights to the area's forests...
...bullets and RPGs targeted the SAS rescue convoy, which was making its way through the valley without lights. By now, however, the odds had changed. A U.S. forward air controller traveling with the Australians summoned the AC-130, call sign reaper, whose laser-guided bombs smashed into the Sabari bunkers...
...That's of little comfort to the Sabari villagers. The morning after the bombs fell, they say, Australian and U.S. officers drove into Zambar in their Humvees to apologize. They promised compensation, says Haji Khannamuddin, but three years on, not a penny has been paid. He and other village elders say most of the men killed on the mountainside that night were fathers. They leave behind almost 50 children, with no means of support other than handouts from fellow villagers. It's a terrible price to pay for somebody else's mistake...