Afghanistan Earthquake Exposes Deadly Cost of Taliban Gender Laws: Women Left to Die in Rubble

THE NEWS

Kunar Province, Afghanistan — Women trapped under rubble after a devastating earthquake in Afghanistan were left to die because Taliban laws forbid male rescuers from touching them, according to multiple reports from the disaster zone.

A 6.0-magnitude earthquake struck the isolated mountains of eastern Kunar province in late August. Mud and stone homes clinging to steep mountainsides collapsed upon sleeping inhabitants. From a helicopter vantage point, entire villages had just been scraped off the sides of hills. The United Nations estimates some 2,200 people were killed and more than 3,600 people were injured, with the majority being women and girls.

Women trapped under rubble were left to suffer and die because men were forbidden from touching them unless they were immediate relatives. In many villages, while men and children were pulled to safety, women bled and cried out but were ignored. Male rescuers, constrained by religious rules, refused to touch them. If no father, brother, husband, or son was present, the women were left until other women from nearby areas arrived. Some never made it out alive. In some cases, bodies were dragged out by their clothes simply to avoid physical contact.

Bibi Aisha, a 19-year-old Afghan woman, told The New York Times that rescuers reached her village 36 hours after the quake, but none were women. While men and children were quickly evacuated, Aisha and other women and girls, some bleeding, were sidelined.

"They gathered us in a corner and forgot about us," she said, noting that no one offered help or checked on their needs.

Tehzibullah Muhazab, a 33-year-old volunteer rescuer in Kunar's Mazar Dara village, said male rescuers hesitated to free women trapped under rubble, leaving them to wait for female help from other villages.

"It felt like women were invisible," he said.

Hamid Badshash, a Kunar resident, described women fleeing the quake only to return for their mandatory headscarves, risking their lives as buildings crumbled. "I heard women turning back to find a hijab after escaping the quake, only to end up trapped," he said. A rescuer in Debgareh village said it took 20 hours to reach the area, where one woman hid behind broken walls upon seeing an all-male team.

Since the Taliban banned women from enrolling in medical education in 2023, the number of female doctors and nurses has collapsed. Hospitals in earthquake-hit areas have been left with no female staff at all. Reporters visiting one facility found not a single woman on duty, leaving female victims untreated or forced to wait.

On September 7, the World Health Organization urged the Taliban authorities to lift their restrictions on female aid workers in Afghanistan in the aftermath of the disaster. WHO representative Mukta Sharma said nearly 90 percent of the earthquake-affected region's medical staff were men, and the remaining 10 percent were women who mainly worked as midwives and nurses and therefore were not trained to tackle severe injuries.

Taliban officials asked aid agencies to send more female health workers to assist female survivors despite the ratcheting restrictions the group has been imposing since they seized power four years ago, which includes preventing most women and girls from study and work.

THE CRUSADER'S OPINION

Women screamed under rubble.

Male rescuers stood there.

And let them die.

Not because the debris was too heavy. Because touching women violates Taliban law.

Bibi Aisha waited 36 hours. When rescuers arrived, they evacuated men and children. Bleeding women were gathered in a corner and forgotten. Some women escaped collapsing buildings, then turned back for hijabs because appearing without head coverings meant worse than being crushed to death. They died retrieving fabric.

One rescuer admitted women felt invisible. They were not invisible. They were screaming. Bleeding. Dying. And men with power to save them chose religious law over human life.

When women died, rescuers dragged corpses out by clothing to avoid touching female skin. Even dead women could not receive dignity.

The Taliban banned women from medical school in 2023. Hospitals have no female staff. Ninety percent of medical workers are men forbidden from treating women. The remaining ten percent are midwives untrained for trauma. Women with crushed limbs die waiting for help the regime systematically eliminated.

Then the Taliban asked international agencies to send female health workers. After destroying their own female medical workforce. Breathtaking hypocrisy.

This is Sharia implemented. Women die in rubble because saving them violates religious rules. Women burn retrieving head coverings because modesty trumps survival. Women bleed out because ideology matters more than life.

The West stays silent. International aid flows. Humanitarian groups negotiate terms. And Afghan women suffocate under debris while the world discusses cultural sensitivity.

The earthquake was natural disaster. Abandoning women was deliberate policy. Every woman left to die represents Islamic law prioritizing religious rules over human survival.

TAKE ACTION

Pray for Afghan women suffering under Taliban oppression. Pray for earthquake victims still waiting for aid. Pray for regime change.

Support organizations helping Afghan women:

• Women for Afghan Women - Supporting Afghan women and girls
• Afghan Women's Network - Advocating for women's rights in Afghanistan

Contact government representatives:

• Demand sanctions on Taliban leadership for gender apartheid
• Urge suspension of all aid to Afghanistan until women receive equal treatment
• Call for international intervention protecting Afghan women's basic human rights

Share this story. The world's silence kills Afghan women. Break the silence.