DOGE Targeted Him on Social Media. Then the Taliban Took His Family.

[muriel_volestrangler]

Afghan scholar Mohammad Halimi, who fled the Taliban in 2021, had worked to help U.S. diplomats understand his homeland. Then DOGE put his family’s lives at risk by exposing his sensitive work for a U.S.-funded nonprofit.

“United States Institute of Peace Funded Taliban,” the post read. At the bottom, the post named Halimi and described him as a “former Taliban member,” and the payments to him as U.S. support for the militants. Below that, thousands of comments tumbled in, calling him a terrorist and a grifter. Republican U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia later chimed in to congratulate Musk for discovering that “the federal government is paying the Taliban and they covered it up.”
...
This all made him an obvious target. The Taliban had attempted to assassinate Halimi as a traitor at least three times during the U.S. occupation. And the U.S. government knew he had faced real danger in the past. He narrowly managed to flee Afghanistan in the final days before the U.S.-backed government fell to the Taliban, with the help of the second-highest-ranking CIA officer in the country. Since then, he had tried to live a mostly quiet life, partly to keep the relatives he’d left behind safe from retribution.
...
About a week after DOGE outed him, Halimi’s worst fears were realized. Taliban intelligence agents in Kabul descended on the homes of his relatives and detained three of his family members. They were blindfolded, thrown into the backs of 4x4 pickup trucks and driven to a small remote prison. They were held incommunicado over several days and repeatedly beaten and questioned about Halimi and his recently publicized yet ambiguous work for the United States.

https://www.propublica.org/article/doge-musk-mohammad-halimi-institute-peace-taliban

As the ProPublica article details, "former Taliban member" means "before 2001"; he was a cabinet minister in the U.S.-backed Afghan government. But Musk and Greene recklessly disregarded the truth for clickbait tweets, and got his family beaten. Some of them have then got out of Afghanistan, but have not been granted asylum anywhere (and it's not as if the US is going to do that during the Trump regime).

Halami is wrong about one thing, though: “Sometimes I think that if Elon Musk himself were fully informed about this matter, he would likely be deeply ashamed.” No, Musk would feel no shame about this at all. The DOGE (and Fox News, who were filming DOGE saying "they were paying the Taliban!!!" ) quotes are all "what's the problem with this?". He's the wrong colour for them. The cruelty is the point.

[tulipsandroses]

1. I literally felt sick reading that

So much destruction has been done. Untold number of deaths will occur due to their ignorance and hate.

[yardwork]

8. Same here. He was betrayed by us.

[Solly Mack]

2. K&R

[pansypoo53219]

3. the vets will come for elmo.

[Mr.Bee]

4. DOGE: Dept Of Greed & Evil

[Heidi]

5. Kick, kick, kick!

[Grim Chieftain]

6. Wonder who Trump has buried in what used to be the rose garden

"His" property, nice cement cover...

[Scrivener7]

7. Damn. Kick.

[Stargazer99]

9. The wealthy in this country are the cause of this in their greed,

they killed someone who was trying to save our country because they have too much but it is never enough so we must die if we get in their way. This country has provided the best healthcare, homes, etc to the wealthy but it is not enough they want more and are willing to kill the body and spirit of anyone getting in the way of that objective. God must look down on this country in utter revulsion.