The Bureau of Investigative Journalism reports that 7,180 people have been killed by U.S. drone attacks in Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia and Afghanistan — and this does not include those killed by drone attacks in Afghan­istan before 2015, nor those killed by drone attacks in Iraq, Libya and the Philippines. Also, less than 2 percent of drone casualties are high-value targets, indicating that the bulk of drone casualties have been civilians.

Besides being unlawful and criminal, U.S. wars against Muslim countries and drone strikes on civilians in these countries cause intense hatred against America. Ferea al Muslimi, who studied in the U.S and learned to love America, spoke of his experiences to the people of his village in Yemen, who were impressed until the first drone struck. Later, Muslimi told the U.S. Congress that “instead of first experiencing America through a school or a hospital, most people in Wessab, Yemen, first experienced America through the terror of a drone strike. What radicals had previously failed to achieve in my village, one drone strike accomplished in an instant: there is now an intense anger and growing hatred of America.”

Why has the Mennonite church in the U.S. has not fulfilled its prophetic role? Why have we failed to have a strong corporate witness against the American empire’s wars?

E. Daniel Riehl
Lititz, Pa.