Kareem Rashad Sultan Khan (1987-2007), an American soldier. Colin Powell said it well:
Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country? The answer is no. That’s not America. Is there something wrong with a seven-year-old Muslim American kid believing he or she could be president? Yet I have heard senior members of my own party drop the suggestion that [Obama] is a Muslim and might have an association with terrorists. This is not the way we should be doing it in America.
I feel particularly strong about this because of a picture I saw in a magazine. It was a photo essay about troops who were serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. And one picture at the tail end of this photo essay, was of a mother at Arlington Cemetery and she had her head on the headstone of her son’s grave. And as the picture focused in, you could see the writing on the headstone, and it gave his awards – Purple Heart, Bronze Star – showed that he died in Iraq, gave his date of birth, date of death, he was 20 years old. And then at the very top of the head stone, it didn’t have a Christian cross. It didn’t have a Star of David. It has a crescent and star of the Islamic faith.
And his name was Kareem Rashad Sultan Khan. And he was an American. He was born in New Jersey. He was fourteen years old at the time of 9/11, and he waited until he could serve his country and he gave his life.
– Colin Powell
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Abagond 
I’ve seen this picture before, along with Powell’s words and as a former soldier and now a parent this is one of the most heart warming and at the same time wrenching photos I have ever seen. I love and hate it.
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i have not seen this before – but powells words ring true. And as a mother og three sons – my heart aches for her. what an amazing compelling image.
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Abagond,
Thank you for this. I watched Colin Powell’s endorsement of Obama, listened to his thoughtful reasons for his endorsement & was touched by his telling of Kareem Rashad Sultan Khan’s story in order to demonstrate his disgust with the xenophobia coming out of the McCain campaign.
I have cherished family who are on their 2nd or 3rd tours in Iraq–I’m feeling the desperation to have them home safe & sane.
@Davida: I believe Kareem Rashad Sultan Khan was an only child.
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The emptiness of a the mothers heart – devasting.
of course to those who have lost one out of say three or four – the pain is just as severe.
1 child or one of 10…as my 80 yr old neighbor says – its an old italien saying roughly translated – children are like fingers on a hand – each one different…one does not lose a finger and say – oh well I have four more. The lose is felt in every part of your daily life. And sometimes the lose of one impacts those children left behind – leaving parents missing parts of their soul. Hard to imagine the emptiness…i am an empathetic person (more than I believe most are) and the thought leaves me shaken with an ache in my chest.
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Losing a child is the worse than losing your own life.
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i agree – which is why I become so angry at the thought of paretns who would harm their children. I can not understand it or even begin to. And people try to say that just mental instability..that they are sick…Its not sickness – it is evil..
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