August 15, 2022. I will not look away.

Afghan women, Afghan girls: I see you.

I see you being beaten by the Taliban in the street. I see you fighting for our Islamic right to study and to work. I see you refusing to submit. Through the darkness of the last 12 months, your bravery is what’s kept me going.

Afghan men -- fathers, brothers, sons -- I see you too. I see you standing beside your wives and sisters and mothers, supporting them. You don't submit to the Taliban's vision for our country, just like they don't. And just like I don't.

Every time I ask the world not to look away from Afghanistan, more members of the Taliban follow me on social media. I see you too. And I say: you must seek your legitimacy from the Afghan people. You must honor women’s roles within society and open schools immediately.

I wrote a column about today for The Washington Post. In it, I encouraged the world to engage with the bravery of Afghan women. Help us by refusing to recognize the Taliban until they respect the rights of all Afghans. Until that happens, the travel ban must be reinstated.

On this day last year, I was burning my students' records. Today we have found a welcome in Rwanda, and our girls' educations continue. We are not defeated. Afghan women are not defeated. And we will never submit to the Taliban's vision for Afghanistan. Never.

I can't romanticize any of this. This is all so real. The trauma and the pain of the last year will never go away, but I choose to channel it into the work that I and so many other Afghan women are doing to make Afghanistan a home for all of us.

I'm so grateful for my team at SOLA. I'm so grateful for our global community of supporters that grows larger every day. It all shows me what's possible for our girls, and for Afghanistan, and I will not look away.