Close
KTAR.com
News
Shows
Blogs
KTAR News on 92.3FM

Afghan evacuees mark first US Ramadan with gratitude, agony

Elaha Sultani, 9, and her brother Shafiullah Sultani, 11, pray at the motel room they share with their parents and four siblings in El Paso, Texas, on Saturday, March 26, 2022. The family was evacuated from Afghanistan when the Taliban regained power last summer and spent months in the motel room with only a few possessions – most treasured among them, the green rug where Elaha prayed. Her grandfather brought it from Mecca after her uncle was killed by the Taliban, the family said. (AP Photo/Giovanna Dell'Orto) Afghan refugee Shirkhan Nejat, left, talks to his 2-month-old son, Ansar, at the family's Oklahoma City apartment on Saturday, April 2, 2022. In the background are Joseph Pham, left, a refugee case manager for Catholic Charities of Oklahoma City; a translator, center; and Carly Akard, director of communications for Catholic Charities. (AP Photo/Bobby Ross Jr.) Wolayat Khan Samadzoi prays using beads made in the colors of the flag of his native Afghanistan in his new apartment in Las Cruces, N.M., Saturday, April 2, 2022. Samadzoi and thousands of other Afghans evacuated to the United States as the Taliban regained power last summer are celebrating their first Muslim holy month of Ramadan here – grateful to be safe, but agonizing over their families back home under the repressive Taliban regime. (AP Photo/Giovanna Dell'Orto) Wolayat Khan Samadzoi and his four-year-old son, Gawhar, in a uniform of the Afghan military sewed by his mother, pose under the Afghan flag in their new apartment in Las Cruces, N.M., on Saturday, April 2, 2022. Samadzoi and thousands of other Afghans evacuated to the United States as the Taliban regained power last summer are celebrating their first Muslim holy month of Ramadan here – grateful to be safe, but agonizing over their families back home under the repressive Taliban regime. (AP Photo/Giovanna Dell'Orto) Qais Sharifi, left, and Abdul Amir Qarizada, right, leave the mosque in Las Cruces, N.M., after attending Friday prayer on April 1, 2022. Both Afghan men were evacuated to the United States when Kabul fell to the Taliban without even the time to bring their wives and children. So instead of celebrating the Muslim holy month of Ramadan with their loved ones, they planned to partake of free nightly iftar meals at the Southern New Mexico Islamic Center. (AP Photo/Giovanna Dell'Orto) Wolayat Khan Samadzoi watches through the open balcony door of his apartment for the sliver of new moon to appear in the cloudless sky, where the sun had set beyond a desert mountain, in Las Cruces, N.M., Saturday, April 2, 2022. Samadzoi and thousands of other Afghans evacuated to the United States as the Taliban regained power last summer are celebrating their first Muslim holy month of Ramadan here – grateful to be safe, but agonizing over their families back home under the repressive Taliban regime. (AP Photo/Giovanna Dell'Orto)