Ten medical aid workers have been killed in Afghanistan’s remote northeast region in one of the deadliest attacks on an international aid group since the war started in 2001. The medical workers were members of a team from the International Assistance Mission, a nonprofit Christian organization that has been providing medical care in Afghanistan since 1966. The group is one of the longest-serving non-governmental organizations operating in Afghanistan. The Taliban claimed responsibility and accused the group of spying and seeking to convert Muslims to Christianity. But some officials have questioned the Taliban’s claim and suspect robbery may have been the motive. Six Americans are among the dead, including Dr. Tom Little, a sixty-one-year-old optometrist from Delmar, New York. He had been working in Afghanistan for thirty-four years. The Reverend Harry Heintz said he had known Tom Little for three decades.

Rev. Harry Heintz: “Tom was everything one could want in such a role. He didn’t go there to impose American culture. He didn’t go there to proselytize in insensitive or harsh ways. He went there to live the love of God sensitively, with his deeds speaking much louder than his words.”