U.S. Drone Strike Kills 14 in Wedding Party in Yemen

During his May speech on counterterrorism, President Obama defended the drone program as legal, moral, and accurate and has argued then and since that it is subject to standards of accountability--just, of course, ones that the public cannot see. The president rhetorically flirted with bringing the GWOT to an end although he offered little (or nothing) in terms of policy changes in that direction.

When he met with Malala Yousfazi at the White House in October, she spoke to him about how drone strikes are fueling widespread resentment and facilitating terrorist recruitment:

"I thanked President Obama for the United States' work in supporting education in Pakistan and Afghanistan and for Syrian refugees. I also expressed my concerns that drone attacks are fueling terrorism. Innocent victims are killed in these acts, and they lead to resentment among the Pakistani people. If we refocus efforts on education it will make a big impact."

Obama doesn't seem to have listened to Malala about the immorality and danger involved in killing innocents abroad:

Sanaa, Yemen (CNN) -- A U.S. drone mistakenly targeted a wedding convoy in Yemen's al-Baitha province after intelligence reports identified the vehicles as carrying al Qaeda militants, two Yemeni national security officials told CNN on Thursday. The officials said that 14 people were killed and 22 others injured, nine in critical condition. The vehicles were traveling near the town of Radda when they were attacked.

U.S. officials, per CNN, have declined to comment. That comes as no surprise as the U.S. still refuses to acknowledge the large civilian death toll of its drone war. 

Attacks like yesterday's highlight the immorality and illegality of the president's targeted killing policy and refute its defenders' claims of supreme accuracy and "surgical" cleanness.