Nov 13, 2026 · 25 min
A drone strike’s aftermath follows one Afghan boy into adulthood
"Mohabat": New Film Follows 12-Year-Old Afghan Boy After U.S. Drone Strike Kills His Father
The film connects one family’s loss to the political decisions, social pressures, and international isolation shaping Afghanistan after the U.S. withdrawal.
- 1James Longley spent 15 months filming rural Afghanistan after the Taliban returned to power, documenting lives largely absent from city-focused coverage.
- 2A 2019 U.S. drone strike killed six people and fractured Mahabat’s family, while conflicting accounts left responsibility publicly unresolved.
- 3Longley argues that engagement with the Taliban may be necessary to ease Afghanistan’s humanitarian crisis despite its repression of women and girls.
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Longley recounts how the 2019 strike killed six people, devastated Mahabat’s family, and helped push one grieving man toward the Taliban.
The brief
James Longley discusses Mahabat, his documentary about a 12-year-old Afghan boy whose father died in a 2019 drone strike, and the family’s struggle afterward.
After the Taliban takeover, Longley returned to Afghanistan for 15 months, traveling beyond cities to film rural communities and the war’s consequences through Afghan eyes.
The strike killed six people, injured survivors, and fractured Mahabat’s family; Longley says the United States never publicly explained what happened or who was responsible.
Mahabat entered a Taliban orphanage while his brothers carried adult burdens, showing how a single attack reshaped a family long after the battlefield moved on.
Longley weighs Taliban repression against Afghanistan’s humanitarian isolation, arguing that engagement may be the only pragmatic route to help ordinary people.
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