Will you thank Nicholas Kristof, columnist for The New York Times?

Mr. Kristof has written a moving piece showing the deadly costs of US tear gas sales to Bahrain’s Khalifa dictatorship:

People here admire much about America and welcomed me into their homes, but there is also anger that the tear gas shells that they sweep off the streets each morning are made by a Pennsylvania company, NonLethal Technologies. It is a private company that declined to comment, but the American government grants it a license for these exports — and every shell fired undermines our image.

Kristof goes on to write:

The repression is ubiquitous. Consider Zainab al-Khawaja, 28, whose husband and father are both in prison and have been tortured for pro-democracy activities, according to human rights reports. Police officers have threatened to cut off Khawaja’s tongue, she told me, and they broke her father’s heart by falsely telling him that she had been shipped to Saudi Arabia to be raped and tortured.

She braved the risks by talking to me about this last week — before she was arrested too.

Reporting like this is what forces US officials to back away from policies that stand in the way of democracy.

Please join us in thanking Mr. Kristof for this important piece.