On Oct. 24, 2012, a U.S. drone strike killed Mamana Bibi.

Mamana Bibi was a  grandmother. She was working in a field gathering vegetables in  north Waziristan, Pakistan, when a hellfire missile fired by a U.S. drone killed her. Family members say Mamana was a midwife who delivered hundreds of babies in the area.  Her nine grandchildren were nearby and witnessed their grandmother’s death. Several of the children were injured.

The media reported the attack took out five militants.  According to Rafiq ur Rehman, the only person that died that day was his mother.

“No one ever asked us who was killed or injured that day. Not the United States or my own government. Nobody has come to investigate nor has anyone been held accountable. Quite simply, nobody seems to care.

“I care, though. And so does my family and my community. We want to understand why a 67-year-old grandmother posed a threat to one of the most powerful countries in the world. We want to understand how nine children, some playing in the field, some just returned from school, could possibly have threatened the safety of those living a continent and an ocean away.”

Mamana Bibi.

Pause for a moment and say her name out loud.

When the U.S. government reports drone strike casualties, it never tells you their names, unless of course it took out an important “terrorist target.” Official reports never name civilians killed – or collateral damage – as the military calls it.

But every single one of the 2,400 people killed by U.S. drone strikes in Pakistan alone had names. They were mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, grandparents and friends.

They were human beings.

They had names.

“But now, this is what the Lord says— he who created you, Jacob, he who formed you, Israel: ‘Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have summoned you by name; you are mine.'” (Isaiah 43:1)

Our name implies we have significance. It represents our individuality. Michael Radford Maharrey is somebody – not a nameless, faceless abstraction in a anonymous mass.

Mamana Bibi was somebody.

Say her name again.

And the next time you hear about people killed in a drone strike, think of her.

Official reports devoid of names and filled with euphemisms make it easy to accept the ravages of war. It’s easy to shrug at the death of “five civilians.” It’s not so easy to brush of the death of Mamana Bibi. Or Azam Mohammed. Or Aziz Tariq. It shouldn’t be easy.

And we shouldn’t accept it.