I started to write this month's column last night on another subject while listening to the news in the background and heard a disturbing report that a popular restaurant in Kabul was the latest attack by the Taliban. With great trepidation I did a Google search for more details and to my great sadness it was the restaurant that I feared.

While in Afghanistan a few months ago my journalist friend said we were going to a very special place for dinner to meet a friend of over 30 years who was back in Kabul once again after a period of 8 years in France and she was anxious to reconnect with him.

As soon as we walked in I felt as though we had been transformed back in time and were at Ricks in Casablanca. The room was filled with people speaking many different languages and having a great time in a safe haven away from all the troubles close by out on the street. To get in you went through steel doors in an adobe wall with 2 or 3 armed guards, then a few steps further another group of guards and more steel doors and finally into the restaurant.

The owner, Kamal Hamade greeted us with great fanfare and the food started coming, plates and plates of the best Lebanese and Afghan food, topped off with his specialty, Lebanese chocolate cake.

It is no longer; the Taverna du Liban was the restaurant attacked and Kamal was killed along with 12 other foreigners and 8 Afghans. A tragedy that I am afraid will be repeated in the coming months, possibly years as the U.S. prepares to pull out. The Taliban is claiming more and more territory all the time.

Before we started the war in Afghanistan there was, of course, repression and problems and life was not a "piece of cake" by any stretch of the imagination, but there was a sort of order to the chaos and the people had a sense of how to cope within their tribal cultures. Enter the U.S. and that order became chaotic by us opening up a hornet's nest of Taliban.

The Taliban does not want help, they do not want interference from NGO's who are truly trying to help the Afghan people. They want the population uneducated and submissive. They do not want agricultural reforms replacing the poppies. They are religious fanatics who are cruel beyond imagination.

So what are we to do? I wish some wise sage could come up with an answer. We once again attacked a country for our own reasons and totally unbalanced the system and are now leaving a huge mess behind. Look at Iraq; same story, more violence than before we went in. We MUST stop interfering in countries where we know nothing about the customs or people, and stop this insane nation building.

Perhaps Obama recognizes this by his refusal to enter the Syrian fray and is really trying hard to avoid war with Iran. I certainly hope that is the case and that the people of this country respect that and demand that Congress lift the sanctions on Iran and give diplomacy a chance instead of destroying yet another country by war.

Not only was Kamal a friend to all who entered his space he also was a friend to homeless dogs who dropped by for great snacks each night, and there were many. Who will feed them now........