The conflict has led to Yemen's de facto partition, with rival armies and institutions in the north and south, and could mean the map of the Middle East will have to be redrawn.
Behind the combatants' disagreements over how to share power, Yemen's future as a unified state appears increasingly in doubt.
The Houthis' rise to power in the north has provoked a revival of southern separatism, a movement that sees the fracturing of state power as its moment to break away.
At the same time, the south and its major city, Aden, serve as a base for the internationally recognized government, which is trying to take back national control even as it manages an uneasy alliance with the secessionists.
Many southerners now believe their time has come after two decades of what they see as marginalization within the unified state, and the plundering of mostly southern oil reserves by corrupt northern tribal sheikhs and politicians.
Southern soldier Faisal al-Salmi says he and his comrades are ready to die to be rid of the northerners.
"We have become an independent state thanks to God and the leadership of the Arab coalition ... southern lands have been liberated by the blood of her sons and have loosed the bonds of unity which brought only terrorism, cronyism, and the looting of the people's wealth," Salmi told Reuters.
Now the two peoples seldom dare to cross mine-strewn front lines and the rugged mountains separating security forces flying different national flags.
But a split could bring more instability along one of the world's busiest shipping lanes, perhaps by setting the scene for a fight over the south's oilfields, or by triggering, as in 1994, efforts by the north to dominate the south.
For now, both sides appear to be setting up parallel institutions that could pave the way for an enduring divorce.
"The Houthis realize they probably won't reconquer southern lands, so have strengthened their base with its own administration, while the government wants as many state tools under its control and serving its interests as possible," said Yemeni analyst Farea al-Muslimi.
"But moves like these deepen distrust on both sides and delay negotiations which everybody realizes are the only way to end the conflict," he added.
Paradoxically, neither rival administration says it seeks a partition but rather styles itself the legitimate heir to a unified country to follow the war.
While Hadi may wish to extend his writ to Sanaa, the army commanders who have built up southern forces and made progress against al Qaeda and Islamic State are veteran secessionist guerrillas with no interest in the North.
Senior Houthi official Mohammed Abdul Salam accused the United Arab Emirates, which is influential in the south, of encouraging separatism to advance its war goals.
In meiner langen Laufbahn als Journalist und Filmemacher habe ich noch nie so eine Propaganda erlebt, wie sie sich heute in unser Leben schleicht und damit durchkommt.
In my career as a journalist and filmmaker, I have never known propaganda to insinuate our lives and as it does now and to go unchallenged.
Imagine two cities. Both are under siege by the forces of the government of that country. Both cities are occupied by fanatics, who commit terrible atrocities, such as beheading people. But there is a vital difference. In one siege, the government soldiers are described as liberators by Western reporters embedded with them, who enthusiastically report their battles and air strikes. There are front-page pictures of these heroic soldiers giving a V-sign for victory. There is scant mention of civilian casualties.
Another difference is that the government soldiers laying siege to this city are the “bad guys,” condemned for assaulting and bombing the city – which is exactly what the good soldiers do in the first city.
Without this drumbeat of propaganda dressed up as news, the monstrous ISIS and Al Qaeda and the Nusra Front and the rest of the jihadist gang might not exist, and the people of Syria might not be fighting for their lives today.
Some may remember in 2003 a succession of BBC reporters turning to the camera and telling us that British Prime Minister Tony Blair was “vindicated” for what turned out to be the crime of the century, the invasion of Iraq. The U.S. television networks produced the same validation for George W. Bush. Fox News brought on former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger to effuse over then-Secretary of State Colin Powell’s fabrications.
The West’s medieval client, Saudi Arabia – to which the U.S. and Britain sell billions of dollars’ worth of arms – is at present destroying Yemen, a country so poor that in the best of times, half the children are malnourished.
Look on YouTube and you will see the kind of massive bombs – “our” bombs – that the Saudis use against dirt-poor villages, and against weddings, and funerals. The explosions look like small atomic bombs. The bomb aimers in Saudi Arabia work side-by-side with British officers. This fact is not on the evening news.
While U.S.-backed bombing continues, government officials can’t even agree on which agencies are involved.
There’s little evidence that the Obama administration is keeping its promise to review the U.S. role in a war that has killed more than 10,000 people in Yemen, The Huffington Post has found after conversations with more than a dozen U.S. officials, congressional staffers, analysts and human rights advocates.
The White House announced the review in a statement on Oct. 8, 12 hours after a Saudi-led coalition strike killed 140 people and injured hundreds more.
Three weeks later, the U.S. military continues to refuel jets and provide targeting assistance for the Saudi-led coalition trying to restore Yemen’s internationally recognized government.And confusion reigns over what the review looks like or involves, with the administration failing to even identify which agencies are involved in the process.
The Obama administration’s various arms have yet to get the story straight. On Thursday, Defense Department spokesman Christopher Sherwood told HuffPost that the Pentagon isn’t even involved in the review, but a day later, a State Department official emailed to say that it is.
White House spokeswoman Dew Tiantawach declined to provide any evidence the administration is actually reassessing its policy.
Asked about the structure of the review, the agencies involved, who would be leading it, when it would conclude, and whether the U.S. would halt support for the Saudi-led coalition during the review, Tiantawach pointed HuffPost to previous statements from White House and State Department spokespeople at press briefings.
But the briefings do not contain answers to those questions.
While the White House dithers, U.S. tanker planes are helping Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco and other countries spend more time in the air bombing Yemeni infrastructure and killing civilians with U.S.-made jets.
But the Saudis likely recognize that U.S. support for their efforts in Yemen is not really in doubt — especially since the U.S. has stood by as they’ve slaughtered civilians for 18 months, argued Scott Paul, a senior humanitarian policy adviser at human rights nonprofit Oxfam America.
Comment by Judith Brown: A very interesting article - worth reading to the end. Obama promised a investigation into the Saudi bombing if Yemen but so far no evidence of it, three weeks after the announcement - despite Obama lawyers thinking there could be a case for prosecution of US on this issue.
For the first time since UNHRC's inception in 2006, Russia has lost an election to the UN Human Rights Council after being narrowly beaten by Croatia in a vote. Saudi Arabia was successfully re-elected, despite criticism from human rights organizations.
The 47 places on the council are distributed on a regional basis, with staggered ballots seeing a third of the body re-elected each year.
The elections took place against a backdrop of criticism from non-governmental human rights organizations, who say that the body has been hijacked by oppressive regimes looking to deflect criticism and drive their own agendas.
Saudi Arabia used its power in the council to block an outside inquiry into the campaign last month, while leading a successful resolution that placed the responsibility of investigating human rights abuses in the hands of its allies, the exiled Yemeni government.
Riyadh has repeatedly refused visits from UNHRC rapporteurs looking to investigate the justice system, incidences of torture, and discrimination.
Comment: This Human Rights Council just is a ridiculous event and unable to serve as watchdog for Human Rights.
Human Rights Watch had said accepting Saudi Arabia and Russia's bids for membership would be contrary to the basic standards for which the Human Rights Council was created 10 years ago, and risk undermining the credibility of the UNs top human rights body and its ability to hold abusers accountable. Human Rights Watch had also expressed serious concerns about the "poor human rights records" of China and Egypt running for three-year council terms.
own crimes and abuses," UN director at Human Rights Watch Louis Charbonneau had said.
the ideals that underpin the UN Human Rights Council."
This week's Yemen vote demonstrates something apparent since the vote to invade Iraq: the party of war holds a majority in the Commons.
To sum up, on Wednesday night, the British parliament sent the green light to Saudi Arabia and its allies to carry on bombing, maiming and killing. I have reported politics from Westminster for almost 25 years and can recall few more shocking parliamentary events.
Shocking – but not surprising. The Yemen vote demonstrates something that has been apparent ever since the vote on 18 March 2003 to support the invasion of Iraq: the party of war holds a majority in the Commons.
It comprises virtually all of the Conservative Party and the Blairite wing of Labour. As Nafeez Ahmed wrote in July, there is a clear and demonstrable connection between the vote for war in Iraq, opposition to an Iraq inquiry, support for the calamitous intervention in Libya, and opposition to Jeremy Corbyn.
Ahmed showed the majority of those who tried to unseat Corbyn last summer were interventionist. Some 172 supported the motion of no confidence in Corbyn’s leadership. By coincidence or not, exactly the same number of MPs have supported Britain’s calamitous overseas wars.
Nevertheless there is a telling pattern here. For the past 15 years, parliament has been governed by a cross-party consensus in favour of war. During that period, Britain has undertaken three major foreign interventions, each one of them utterly disastrous. In each one, military success was swiftly followed by political and, ultimately, state failure.
Very few parliamentarians opposed all these interventions. Jeremy Corbyn was among them and he has never been forgiven for it.
For the past 20 years, the so-called "modernisers", whether Blair’s Labour or Cameron’s Conservatives, have been in charge at Westminster. As has been well-documented (not least by Labour’s Jon Cruddas), they have hollowed out British politics through techniques of spin and electoral manipulation.
Comment: A lot of reporting on this debate and vote linked in Yemen Press Reader 220, cp10.
Tehran’s support for the Houthis is minimal at best, and its influence in Yemen is non-existent. It is simply inaccurate to state that the Zaidi Houthis are Shia Iranian proxies.
One thing that is beginning in to bug me the most when reading anything analysing the Yemen Crisis is the claptrap narrative being pumped out by practically everyone covering the Yemen conflict since it began over a year ago.
The idea that Iran is somehow heavily involved in what is happening in Yemen and pulling all the strings behind the Houthi forces fighting both Saudi Arabia, Al-Qaeda and now it seems the USA. This narrative is grossly exaggerated at best if not almost completely false and misleading to people who genuinely want to understand the truth in Yemen, not just what Saudi Arabia thinks is going on.
I would like to clear a few things up in this humble article of mine for people who want a much more honest description of who is really involved in Yemen conflict and to what extent.
Yemen, like Syria, has lost all meaningful government authority and has descended into chaos. As a result, all the larger regional and international superpowers have entered the conflict to take advantage of Yemen’s vulnerability, in order to fight it out with one another for resources, power and a political foothold.
The Houthis are variously labelled as “Iranian-supported,” “Iranian-backed,” or “Iranian-influenced” but practically all credible media sources that cover the Yemen in depth with exhausted studies have concluded the Iranian involvement in supporting the Houthis is minimal at best.
Despite this, you find when trying to read into what’s happening in Yemen, practically every article is written from a Saudi perspective only. The Houthis are always labelled the ‘Shia-Rebels’ or ‘Iranian-backed’, this is what annoys me and many Yemenis that I have spoken to also share my frustrations.
The Iranians do indeed speak about Yemen regularly and yes there are Iranian ships off the coast of Yemen right now which have American media in a panicked frenzy since last week but Iran’s involvement in the conflict has been grossly exaggerated and used by the countries currently dropping bombs on civilians to justify their war crimes.
Are the Houthis actually an Iranian proxy?
A true Iranian proxy ally would also openly admit that it follows orders from Iran, both the Houthi’s and the Iranians have admitted publicly that they are not directly coordinating strategy with each other.
The Houthis have looked to Iran for sympathy in the struggle against Saudi Arabia and American imperialism. What they perceive as a Saudi puppet government in Sanaa led by Hadi. The Iranian establishment, in turn, sympathises with the Houthi cause due to a desire to pressure Saudi politically but that is as deep as the relationship goes, for now at least.
Bei einem Luftangriff auf ein Gefängnis im Jemen sind einem örtlichen Mitarbeiter der Gesundheitsbehörden zufolge mindestens 60 Menschen getötet worden. Mindestens 30 weitere Menschen seien bei dem Bombardement auf einen von Huthi-Rebellen kontrollierten Sicherheitskomplex in der Hafenstadt Hodeida verletzt worden.
Kommentar: Das ist die aktuelle Zahl an Toten, mittlerweile sind es schon 62.
Im Jemen sind bei einem Luftangriff auf ein Gefängnis mindestens 60 Menschen getötet worden. Der Komplex steht unter der Kontrolle der Huthi-Rebellen, die im seit 2014 andauernden Bürgerkrieg gegen die Truppen des sunnitischen Präsidenten Hadi kämpfen.
Bei einem Luftangriff auf ein Gefängnis im Westen des Jemen sind mindestens 60 Menschen getötet worden. Hinzu kämen mindestens 30 Verletzte. Das gaben Gesundheitsbehörden des Landes bekannt.
Das Gefängnis in der Hafenstadt Hodeida wird von Huthi-Rebellen kontrolliert und war am Samstagabend von der von Saudi-Arabien geführten Militärkoalition bombardiert worden. In dem Komplex waren zum Großteil Gegner der Huthis inhaftiert. Zunächst hatten Behörden von mehr als 30 Toten und Dutzenden Verletzten gesprochen - darunter sowohl Rebellen als auch Häftlinge.
Neben der Attacke auf das Gefängnis warfen die Rebellen der Militärkoalition zudem einen Angriff auf ein Viertel der Stadt Salu im Südwesten des Landes vor. Die Stadtverwaltung bestätigte die Angriffe: Drei Wohnhäuser seien komplett zerstört worden, alle Einwohner seien dabei ums Leben gekommen. Laut den Huthis gab es mindestens 17 Tote.
A: Wo sind die entrüsteten "Barbarei"-Äußerungen einer Samantha Power? Wo haben sich unsere Politiker hinverkrochen, da sie anscheinend die Nachrichten aus dem Jemen nicht sehen, nicht hören und dazu nichts sagen wollen?
Sind nicht alle Menschen gleich, also auch Leben im Jemen gleich viel wert wie in Ost-Aleppo (und nebenbei bemerkt auch West-Aleppo)?
Nach dem peinlichen Schweigen zu den Bombardements im Jemen stellt sich doch immer mehr die westliche Doppelmoral heraus. Man kritisiert nur diejenigen und wirft denen unbewiesene Aktionen vor, die gegen die eigenen geopolitischen Interessen stehen (Russland, Syrien), aber man lässt diejenigen ungeniert gewähren (die das tun, was man den anderen vorwirft), die auf der "richtigen" Seite stehen.
G: Saudi-Arabien hat den Vorsitz im UN-Menschenrechtsrat..... Bin mal gespannt, ob heute hier im Forum jemand dafür eine Rechtfertigung parat hat.
wie sieht es mit einem deutschen Waffenembargo aus, für dieses Land ?
Das Gefängnis wird von den Rebellen gehalten.
Dann werden da ja tendenziell die drin sitzen, die gegen die Rebellen sind.
In einem Gefängnis sind tendenziell mehr Insassen als Wärter.
Heisst das: Saudi Arabien hat Leute bombardiert, die auf der eigenen Seite stehen, um ein paar Rebellen zu erledigen?????
"Luftangriffe ... der saudisch geführten Militärkoalition"
Und was soll das für eine "Militärkoaliton" sein?
Saudi-Arabien und Katar bomben hier seit geraumer Zeit ein Nachbarland mit US-Flugzeugen und US-Hubschraubern, mit US-Bomben und US-Raketen und von den USA ausgebildeten Piloten aus SA und Katar.
Kann man das nicht auch mal so benennen, anstatt mit Wortakrobatik zu umschreiben und damit zu vernebeln?
Im Jemen sind bei einem Luftangriff der von Saudi-Arabien geführten Koalition auf eine von Houthi-Rebellen kontrollierte Stadt mindestens 45 Menschen getötet worden. Örtliche Behörden, Mediziner und Angehörige berichteten am Sonntag, bei dem Angriff auf Hodeidah am Roten Meer sei ein Gefängnis getroffen worden. Unter den Toten seien auch Häftlinge.
At least 60 prisoners were killed and 38 others wounded when the US-backed Saudi-led coalition aggression fighter jets bombed a prison early on Sunday in al- Zaydiya district of al-Hodayda port city.
The fighter jets targeted the prison since Sunday dawn and lasted their air striking for hours.
The prison was totally collapsed.
Earlier the day, the rescue teams have recovered nearly 43 bodies and dozens of wounded from under the rubble of the prison building. Later this morning, the initial death toll rose 60 and 38 injured. Medical officials told Saba that the death toll could rise in the next hours because a lot of injured were in critical conditions and the hospitals are suffering from acute shortage of medicines due to the 19-month prolonged air, sea and land blockade.
The Health Office in the city called people to donate blood to save the injured.
Saudi-led coalition air strikes on security buildings in Yemen's west have killed 60 people and 35 injured. One of the buildings was a detention center, where over 100 inmates were being held.
Sixty people in total were killed and dozens were wounded," said a health official. "All the victims are civilians," Abdel-Rahman Jarallah, the director of Hudaydah health office, said.
Most of the victims were anti-rebel detainees who were being held in two cells at the detention centre in Zaidia, north of Hodeidah., a source who requested anonymity told the German news service DPA.
It remains unclear why the coalition would hit a detention centre holding anti-rebel inmates.
Arab coalition warplanes bombed a security complex near the Yemeni port city of Hodeidah, killing 60 people including inmates of a prison on the site, a regional official, relatives and medical sources said on Sunday.
The prison in the city's al-Zaydiyah district was holding 84 inmates when it was struck three times late on Saturday, Hashem al-Azizi, deputy governor of the Houthi rebel-controlled Hodeidah province of the same name, told Reuters.
Local officials said the site lies within a security complex for the area guarded by Houthi militiamen but that only prison security guards were present during the night-time air strike.
A Reuters witness at the security complex said the entire building was destroyed and medics pulled about 17 bodies away - many of them missing limbs - while others remained stuck under the rubble.
Arab coalition warplanes struck a security building in Yemen's Hodeidah city used by Houthi forces as a command center, the Saudi-led alliance said on Sunday in its first comment on an attack that local sources and relatives said killed 60 people.
"Coalition aircraft this morning targeted the central security building in Hodeidah. This building is used by Houthi militia and the forces of the deposed president as a command and control center for their military operations," a coalition statement said, referring to former head of state Ali Abdullah Saleh, a Houthi ally.
Comment: LOL. Copy and Paste excuse.
Comment by Judith Brown: well it seems strange to me that Saudi claim a prison was a control and command centre. They always have excuses. What about the house in Taiz killing 9 and the two civilian cars fleeing bombs in Saada and Marib? What is the excuse there?
Dozens of prisoners and security personnel are feared dead after Saudi-led airstrikes battered two prisons inside a security headquarters in a western port city in Yemen.
Security and medical officials say the airstrikes bombed the al-Zaydiya security headquarters in the Red Sea port city of Hodeida on Saturday. The building contained two prisons and many prisoners along with security forces have been killed in the strikes, the officials said.
The city is under control of Yemen's Shiite Houthi rebels who have seized the capital and much of the northern region in 2014. The Houthis' TV network al-Masirah said that 43 people were killed in the airstrikes but it was not immediately possible to verify its account.
The airstrikes came hours after warplanes rained bombs on houses of civilians in the western city of Taiz, killing at least 18 people, including children, earlier in the day.
Comment: Cole is right. Even to Saudi measures, police is no “military target”.
Saudi fighter jets have killed over 46 people in their latest airstrike on Yemen’s western coastal province of Hudaydah.
According to the al-Masirah television network, some 20 people were also injured in the Saturday night attacks, which were carried out on a security building in the city of Zaydiyah.
Local officials said that three separate strikes were launched on the facilities and noted that most of the casualties had been prisoners.
The Saudi Arabia warplanes and its alliance launched 2 airstrikes on the house of the civilian/ Abdullah Abdu Hamoud AL-Shehab and killed (11) civilians including 5 children and 5 women and injured 3 others . The airstrikes destroyed the house, damaged 6 others, destroyed a car and a mosque in AL Sharaf area, AL-Sulo district.
• They also launched 2 airstrikes on the house of the civilian/ Yaqoub Ha'el Sa'eed and killed (6) civilians including (3) children and a woman and injured (5) others. The airstrikes destroyed the house and damaged (8) others in AL-Ma'baran area, AL-Sulo district.
Comment: Seems to be “only” 10 killed: man, Wife, 8 sons and daughters, among them 4 children.
The air strike hit the house of a citizen named Abdullah Abdo in a southern district called al-Salw, officials said.
Comment by Judith Brown: So Saudi kills Yemenis in Taiz. Although Islah, Salafist and Abu Abbas. militias and their supporters in Taiz constantly harass me stating that it is 'only' the Houthis who are killing Taiz children, here is a story to the contrary. In truth the ordinary people of Taiz are suffering terribly from a ground war, but although their humanitarian situation is serious I have not seen any of the pictures of seriously starving people in Taiz, such as those photos I receive in dozens every day from the Tihama, where the people are suffering under the Saudi led embargo. Of course Taiz is horrible - although a UN report did say that people could get out along the mountains if they wished to do so, but I am not going to criticise people who want to stay in their home area - but the violent deaths and injuries are caused by the war between a range of militias, mercenaries and armies, as well as from Saudi aerial bombardment.
Comment: The propaganda smoke seems to disappear. Even the British government now writes: “apparently targeting Jeddah’s King Abdulaziz International Airport”. Does this mean the propaganda flip flop will stop now? No attack at Mecca, and the missile did not arrive at its target?
Comment by Judith Brown: I have been told the alleged Mecca missile attack pictures that were released by KSA and shown on CNN were from earlier footage from YouTube. I really have no opinion on this - propaganda is everything in war. But why would the Houthi militias fire at Mecca? It seems like an illogical target from my perspective - I have no further view and it is only raising the issue. I really don't know if a missile was fired at Jedda airport either nor whether it struck its target. It's so,difficult to assess these sorts of reports from where I am now. Reports in war are notoriously made up in order to give your 'side' an advantage. So without collaboration I can only report claims and counterclaims.
Spokesman of the army, staff brigadier Sharaf Ghaleb Luqman, has affirmed that the coordinates of the targets of the army and popular committees are set at 100% accuracy to cause big damages as much as possible to the enemy’s military forces.
In a statement to Saba, Luqman said that the first operation against King Abdulaziz Airport in Jeddah which took place on Thursday using Volcano 1 missile was successful and hit the designated target.
He pointed out that news by the enemy’s media that the missile was intended to another location is no more than a media war to mislead the public opinion.
Luqman also affirmed that the army and popular committees are keen, since the onset of the war up to the moment, to avoid attacking civilian areas, let alone the Islamic sanctities, and we will not be driven to such actions.
“It is ridiculous what has been circulated by the aggression’s media that we targeted the Holy Mecca which are we are ready to sacrifice our lives and all that is in our possession to protect it,” Luqman said.
Comment: The missile really hit its target Jeddah airport????
Yemen’s Houthi Ansarullah movement has strongly dismissed claims that the recent missile attack against Saudi Arabia was aimed at Islam's holiest and most revered site, emphasizing that the Saudi regime is restoring to media hype to justify its military aggression against its southern neighbor.
Ansarullah spokesman Mohammad Abdulsalam, in a statement released on Friday, said Saudi officials are looking for sympathy in the name of guardianship of the Masjid al-Haram in the holy city of Mecca, and availing themselves of media frenzy – something which nobody actually believes in.
"The Yemeni nation needs no proof to show its Arab and Muslim identity. It has never targeted religious sites, and definitely treats religious rites with much greater respect compared to US mercenaries. Aggressors must end their attacks and siege against Yemen, embrace peace and observe the principle of good neighborliness," the Ansarullah spokesman pointed out.
Even with the brutal wars raging in parts of the Middle East, some acts stand out for their despicable nature. That the Houthi rebels would fire a missile at the most sacred site in Islam defies belief. Fortunately, the Saudi Arabian military was able to intercept the missile, but the act still marks a shocking escalation in the war in Yemen.
In one sense, perhaps we should not be surprised. The Iranian-backed Houthis have taken every opportunity to destabilise Yemen and Saudi Arabia. They have shown no interest in negotiations, have not respected ceasefires and have shown nothing but contempt for the people of Yemen. The humanitarian crisis that they have sparked shows no sign of abating and despite multiple opportunities to pursue peace – or even merely talks – they have not. This from a group that claims to represent the will of the Yemeni people – and whose flag includes the slogan "Victory to Islam". The group has yet to explain how targeting Islam’s holiest shrine would aid that victory.
With ISIL slaughtering civilians in the most horrific ways and the Houthis now targeting the holiest sites of Islam, the militias who have taken hold of parts of the Middle East appear unwilling to respect any norms. Yet there is a crucial difference with the Houthis, because they are backed by groups who have, or did have, international respectability. While this missile strike raises some very serious questions for the Houthis, it also raises hard questions for their backers, both Ali Abdullah Saleh and the Iranian government.
On Twitter, Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed, Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, asked how the Iranian government could continue supporting the Houthis after they fired on Mecca. "Is this an Islamic regime as it claims to be?" he asked. The same question must be directed at the former Yemeni president. Mr Saleh still has considerable support in northern Yemen. It is only because of that the Houthis have managed to hold on to territory.
Both must now condemn the attack and distance themselves from the group. The Iranians cannot continue sending weapons to a group that uses them to attack Islam’s holy shrines, nor can Mr Saleh back them. Failure to do so will make them complicit in what seems like an attack not on one state, but on an entire religion.
Comment: A full power propaganda, shooting not only at the Houthis and Iran, but trying to involve another foe as well, in this case ex-president Saleh.
The rebel Yemeni Houthi-Saleh group's attempt to target Makkah city, home to the most sacred sites in Islam, including the Grand Mosque, with a ballistic missile fired from Yemen's northwestern Saada province on Thursday night, is, by all means, an atrocious criminal act, the Arab Parliament, a body of the Arab League, said on Friday.
"This criminal act of targeting the Masjid al-Haram (Grand Mosque of Makkah) is evidence that these gangs intend to target the holiest sites for Arabs and Muslims to provoke their feelings," Speaker of the Arab Parliament Ahmed Mohammed Al Jarwan said in a statement.
Al Jarwan called upon Muslim countries "to join forces to prevent the Houthi gangs and their supporters from perpetrating further criminal acts through which they seek to incite sectarian wars that would destroy countries and peoples."
Earlier, the Saudi-led Arab Coalition conducting a campaign to restore legitimacy to Yemen said it had intercepted and destroyed the ballistic missile 65 kilometres from Makkah City.
The Secretary-General of the six-member Co-operation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf (GCC) Dr. Abdullatif Al Zayani, in a statement, condemned the missile attack as "a provocation of the feelings of all Muslims in the world."
Comment: This is the original report by the Emirati Press Agency, see earlier report in YPR 220. The Saudi side fully is beating the propaganda drum, to cause a sectarian showdown in the Muslim world. See earlier reporting in YPR 220.
Yemeni government on Friday said Houthis failed attempt to attack Makkah undermines regional stability and proves they are a menace to world stability.
Comment: Of course, the Hadi government (here in the headline labeled as Yemen = 5 star hotel in Riyadh) also cannot stand aside and shows up with this rather stupid statement. And of course they also play the Saudi anti-Iranian tune.
Im Jemen gehören Angst, Not und Armut zum Alltag. Keine Jobs, kein Geld für Einkäufe, dazu immer wieder Gefechte und Bombenangriffe – Folgen eines Kriegs, dem die Welt kaum Beachtung schenkt.
Jemen, Syrien und Irak hängen zusammen.
Der verbindende Knoten ist eine Regionalmacht,die die Vorherrschaft in der Region für sich beansprucht. Wo sie diese Vorherrschaft durch nicht-wahabitische Bewegungen bedroht sieht, da interveniert sie direkt oder indirekt militärisch. Neben Jemen, Syrien und Irak wäre da auch noch die militärische Niederschlagung des Aufstandes in Bahrain zu nennen - was die eigene Dominanz bedroht, wird rücksichtslos platt gemacht.
Dumm bei der Sache ist nur, dass diese Untaten mit Waffen passiert, die für teuer Geld bei uns eingekauft werden.
Saudi-Arabien ist zwar der Hauptkriegstreiber der Region und eine der übelsten Diktaturen auf der Welt - es ist aber einer unserer besten Partner (und Kunden).
Warum lesen wir nichts über die saudischen Verbrechen, hingegen alles über syrische Verfehlungen?
Kurz gesagt: Die Saudis begehen ihre Verbrechen mit Mercedes, Krauss-Maffei und Heckler&Koch.
klar, wer da der Böse ist, oder?
Kommentar: Überblicksartikel mit einigen Schwächen (Hadis Amtszeit ist längst ausgelaufen).
Yemeni tribes in different provinces have joined forces to counter the deadly Saudi aggression against their country, vowing revenge for the blood of the innocent.
In the northwestern province of Hajjah, the tribes of the Sharafein district expressed their readiness to deploy forces to the battleground in response to a call issued by the tribes of Khulan and Sanhan, Yemen’s al-Masirah television reported on Saturday.
Bani Sara tribe in al-Shaqadreh also said that it was prepared to team up with Khulan al-Tayal tribe to score a victory against the Riyadh regime and take revenge for the recent Saudi carnage in the capital, Sana’a, which was denounced by rights groups as a war crime.
The tribe of Sanhan in Sana’a put 300 troops equipped with arms on alert.
Elsewhere in Ma’rib Province, Qaramish tribe voiced its full preparedness for combat.
Additionally, members of the Azla al-Zabareh tribe from different areas and villages took part in a summit, while uts armed forces strongly condemned the US-Saudi crimes in Yemen and said they are ready to go to battlegrounds.
Also in Ibb Province, the residents of the Sabrah region said that they are set to unite other tribes in their resistance against the Saudi military campaign.
Meanwhile, sheikhs and renowned figures of the Mansuriyah region of Hudaydah province and its tribal members came together and underlined the need for deploying new troops to the front line. They also described the Saudi attacks on civilians as a sign of the regime’s weakness.
In its latest airstrikes, Saudi Arabia bombarded various targets in several Yemeni provinces, including a prison in Hudaydah which claimed scores of lives.
In an interview with Press TV, Alfred Lambremont Webre, a war crimes lawyer, described the latest attack as another flagrant war crime by Saudi Arabia which demands an urgent reaction from the international community.
“Even if they are prisoners of war, they are civilians. They would be civilian prisoners protected by The Geneva Convention. So, this is another intentional war crime. The Saudi regime is a war crime regime,” Webre underscored.
“Whether or not this [attack] is in retaliation for actions [by Yemenis] on [Saudi] military targets, [It] becomes irrelevant when one is carrying out serial war crimes,” he added.
In other comments about the complicity of Western countries in Saudi Arabia’s invasion of Yemen, Webre opined that all those countries should be treated as "co-defendants."
Why Saudi Arabia Does Not End War on Yemen?
It appears that what more than anything else keeps the Saudis’ pounding of Yemen ongoing is the experience of the Saudi pleasant sway and presence in pre-uprising Yemen and the type of behavior of earlier Yemeni political actors who turned into instruments in the hands of the Saudi kingdom to serve its policies. This is a significant factor that prevents the Saudis from easily coming to terms with the new conditions and accepting shift of the political orientations of the Yemeni revolutionaries led by Ansarullah movement. Furthermore, fears of spread of uprising to the millions of Yemeni employees in Saudi Arabia have pushed the Saudi leaders to even develop concerns about losing their hereditary throne.
It is notable that before revolution of 2011 in Yemen, all of the economic, political, and social parties could be divided into two pro and anti-Saudi sway in their country. As for that period, Riyadh used a diplomacy based on petrodollars and succeeded in taking to its side many of influential political, military, security, and social figures including the tribal leaders, military commanders, and the heads of big political parties in Yemen as well as the country's president, Mansour Hadi. This allowed the kingdom to apply its favorable policies in Yemen.
In fact, Saudi Arabia’s sway in Yemen was possible through spending money and buying loyalty of prominent Yemeni figures in different government structures. This way helped Riyadh to affect the top people who could influence the Yemeni politics and power centers in the country. This influence paved the way for Saudi Arabia to, in line with the West, manipulate the Yemeni political directions through affecting the key actors.
But the important point about the Saudi relations with the pre-revolution Yemen that need to be taken into consideration is that the security of Saudi Arabia was tied to security of Yemen. In other words, insecurity in one of them could carry the potentials of spilling over to the other. This fact draws many concerns of the Saudi Arabian leaders.
But now in new conditions Saudi Arabia lost the influence on the key Yemeni organizations and actors that for nearly half a century prepared the ground for Riyadh’s leaders to easily dictate their demands to the Yemenis.
I get feeling Saudi committing as many massacres as possible in #Yemen hoping world would eventually be desensitized & okay with bloodbath.
Comment: The West is making money out of #Yemeni-s' blood. There is no interest in saving one life.
Comment by Jamila Hanan: Sorry but this headline is nonsense. The West must stop literally refuelling #Yemen war. Only then it will end.
Saudi Arabia will continue its military aggression against Yemen as long as it gets support from the United States and Britain, says an activist and political commentator.
“They are the ones who are funding, and they are the ones who have given the Saudis the green light to commit their crimes in Yemen because if the war continues in Yemen, this means that the United States and Britain will continue selling their weapons to the Saudis,” Hussain al-Bukhaiti told Press TV in an interview on Saturday.
He also mentioned there is no “international investigation” into Saudi Arabia’s crimes in Yemen which is the reason why it continues its offensive against the impoverished Arab country.
The activist went on to say that both the United States and Britain are “directly involved” in the war on Yemen because of their arms sales to Saudi Arabia.
However, he said, Britain has played a “dirty role” by supporting Saudi Arabia’s membership at the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) and blocking two previous investigations into Riyadh’s war crimes in Yemen.
Pointing to Saudi Arabia’s accusation of Yemeni ballistic missile being fired at Mecca, Bukhaiti noted the Saudis are seeking to gather more support from Islamic countries by this allegation.
“So they want to make it as a war to defend Mecca and if the Saudis have reached this point, this means that they are really weak and they are on the brink of either to stop this war or to collapse but it will depend on how long they will get a green light from the US to continue the war on Yemen,” he stated.
Film: A whole generation might be lost in #Yemen after people have been left to become skin and bones in the midst of this forgotten war. We discuss how the international community has allowed the situation to become so horrible.
Comment: US citizens, don’t wonder. It’s the US who is greatly responsible for all this.
The Ministry of Public Health and Population in Yemen has released new figures on the number of cholera and cholera-related deaths in the country.
As of 30 October 2016, a total of 1410 suspected cases of cholera, including 45 associated deaths have been reported. Laboratory-confirmed cases of cholera have been reported from Taiz, Aden, Lahj, Al-Hudaydah, Hajjah, Sana'a, Al-Baida and and Ibb governorates. Of the 116 stools samples tested so far, 55 were positive for Vibrio cholerae 01 Ogawa at the Central Public Health Laboratory of Sana’a.
WHO is working in coordination with the Ministry and partners on the ground under a joint health/WASH taskforce to coordinate the response. WHO has established 21 cholera treatment centres in the most affected governorates, and provided IV fluids, diarrhoeal disease kits and oral rehydration solutions for case management in these centres. WHO also conducted a training workshop for epidemiological surveillance coordinators from 16 out of Yemen's 23 governorates to strengthen cholera case detection, reporting and response.
While acute watery diarrhoeal diseases are endemic in Yemen, the ongoing conflict has exacerbated the situation. More than 7.6 million people are currently living in areas affected by the outbreak, as well as more than 3 million internally displaced persons.
According to statements issued by UN agencies, over 14 million Yemenis, more than half the population, is now living in hunger, while 7 million are on the verge of starvation.
In a press briefing in Geneva Friday, the UN children’s agency UNICEF said that at least 370,000 children are at risk of severe malnutrition, and without urgent treatment will die. Fully 1.5 million children are malnourished.
The World Food Program (WFP) reported that almost half the children of Yemen are already suffering irreversibly stunted growth due to malnutrition. “An entire generation could be crippled by hunger,” said the WFP’s Yemen director, Torben Due.
The UN agency found that at least 10 of the country’s 21 governorates are on the brink of famine.
The past few weeks have witnessed an increase in targeting civilians, including children, by both sides. Just yesterday, the Houthis shelled a market in Taiz killing at least 8 civilians. Similarly, coalition airstrikes killed at least 20 civilians when jets hit the Suq al‐Hunod district of Al‐Hudaydah city. A few days later, airstrikes targeted residential buildings in Ibb city in centra Yemen at dawn killing at least 9 people.
After the decision of the Central Bank to Aden, the situation on the ground remains greatly the same. Government employees remain with no salaries for the second month in a row. The Houthis have called people to donate to the Central Bank. On the other hand, Hadi’s government has announced its commitment to pay all government employees as the register of the year 2014, not including those appointed by Houthis. However, no payment has been made.
The number of suspected cholera cases in war-ravaged Yemen has ballooned to more than 1,400 in under three weeks, according to the World Health Organisation.
An outbreak of the deadly disease was announced in early October in the capital Sanaa, but WHO officials said soon after that it had not spread.
However, the organisation has now announced that there were 1,410 suspected cholera cases in 10 of Yemen’s 23 governorates, mostly in Taiz, Aden, Lahj, Hodeida and Sanaa.
The organisation has released $1m (£820,000) of emergency funding to help combat the illness. More than 7.6 million people are living in the areas affected by cholera.
Around 1.5 million children in Yemen are malnourished and half the population lives in hunger, United Nations aid agencies said on Friday, three days after pictures of an emaciated Yemeni teenager sparked headlines around the world.
Yemen's 18-month war has left 370,000 children at risk of severe malnutrition - a condition which needs urgent treatment to prevent a child from dying - the U.N. children's agency UNICEF said at a press briefing in Geneva on Friday.
"It is really a dire situation on the ground. When you see mothers who have little to eat themselves and they see their children slipping away, it just breaks your heart," said World Food Programme (WFP) spokeswoman Bettina Luescher at the briefing.
"It really is shocking and horrible to see this in the 21st century."
Around 7 million Yemenis are "desperately in need of food", she said, and the situation could worsen as the war rages.
Acting Prime Minister Talal Aqlan met on Saturday in Sana’a with head of Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) mission in Yemen.
During the meeting, they reviewed the medical and humanitarian services provided by the French, Spanish, Swiss, and Netherlands MSF missions in a number of governorates in the country.
They also talked about the overall humanitarian tasks carried out by the mission to contribute to treating the war wounded of the aggression and internal fronts, in addition to providing health services to mothers and children.
The MSF representatives provided a summary of other activities such as transporting wounded people to hospitals and providing first aid and psychological support as well as dialysis reagents and medicines and oxygen as well.
They pointed out that the total of medical assistance provided since March 2016 up to the moment is at 1,750 tons, valuing support and coordination of the Ministry of Public Health and Population.
Guards thwarted a suicide attack on the Yemeni central bank Saturday opening fire on the bomber's vehicle and blowing it up before it reached the building, a security official said.
The central bank has been based in the government-controlled second city of Aden since last month, when President Abedabbo Mansour Hadi ordered its relocation from the rebel-held capital Sanaa accusing the rebels of running down its foreign reserves.
Five guards were wounded when the bomber's vehicle blew up around 30 meters (yards) from the bank building, the security official told AFP.
The force of the blast shattered the bank's windows and caused damage to other nearby buildings.
Witnesses say a car bomb has exploded in the southern city of Aden at a checkpoint steps away from the central bank, which has been relocated recently from the rebel-held capital, Sanaa.
A car laden with explosives blew up near the headquarters of Yemen's central bank in the southern city of Aden on Saturday and five people were injured, local security sources said.
Security guards fired at the car as it moved at high speed toward the bank's building and it then blew up, they said.
The blast caused minor damage to the building in a central district of Aden known as Crater and two cars nearby, one belonging to security guards and the other to a private citizen, caught fire and burned.
It was believed to be the first attempt to target the central bank since President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi's decision in September to appoint a new governor and move its headquarters from the capital Sanaa, controlled by Houthi rebels, to the southern port city of Aden, where his government is based.
Jemens Präsident Hadi hat einen neuen von den Vereinten Nationen vorgelegten Friedensplan abgelehnt.
Mit den Vorschlägen würden die Rebellen bevorzugt und die legitime Regierung bestraft, sagte Hadi bei einem Treffen mit dem UNO-Sondergesandten Scheikh Ahmed in der saudischen Hauptstadt Riad. Der Friedensplan sieht vor, die schiitischen Huthi-Rebellen an der künftigen Regierung zu beteiligen. Zudem soll Hadi einen Großteil seiner Befugnisse an einen Vize-Präsidenten abgeben.
Comment: Hadi wants to stay “president”, whatever happens. And he just wants no participation of the Houthis in a future political settlement. He insists in capitulation of the Houthis, which means, there will be no peaceful solution possible.
Comment by Judith Brown: Hadi is saying that the new peace deal rewards the rebels whilst punishing the Yemeni people. This is crazy. The thing that punishes the Yemeni people is war and whilst the contacts lead me to the conclusion the Houthis are not popular as future rulers they are given credit because they are defending the Yemeni nation against invading nations. The thing about peace is that you haven't sit down with people you hate and make painful compromise. Hadi seems unable to do this - his ultimate goal is to rule Yemen as he did before - not by consent as he is unpopular but as an autocratic ruler.
Yemen's president in exile has turned down a UN peace deal aimed at ending the country's devastating conflict, saying it "rewards" Yemen's rebels.
The proposed peace deal gives the Houthi rebels - who seized the capital Sanaa in 2014 and eventually forced President Abed-Rabbo Mansour Hadi out of Yemen - a share in the future government. It also reduces some of the president's powers in exchange for a rebel withdrawal from major cities.
Yemen’s President Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi refused to receive the political roadmap for peace in Yemen put forth by the U.N. Special Envoy Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed.
The Yemeni government elaborated on the rebuff, saying that the roadmap has a poor understanding of the situation in Yemen and does not agree with most previously set references for peace.
President Hadi rejected the deal after meeting the U.N. Envoy to Yemen Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed in Riyadh.
The internationally recognized president of Yemen and his deputy will not step down or hand over their powers to new leaders until their previously stated conditions are met.
Mr. Hadi told Mr. Ahmed that peace is only attainable when the rebel “coup” is reversed, based on a U.N. Security Council resolution that stipulates the rebels must lay down their weapons and withdraw from cities as a precondition to any peace agreement.
The government official responding to media reports said that the latest U.N.-proposed draft agreement presented to Houthis over looks most fundamental conditions for peace in Yemen such as the outcomes of national dialogue and the Gulf initiative.
“President Hadi’s resignation is out of the question until Houthis first put into effect UN Security Council resolution 2216, a new constitution is approved and an election is held,” Hadi’s aide said on Friday.
What the U.N. envoy presented to Houthis are initial ideas and the government has the right to accept or reject them.
Prime Minister Ahmad Bin Daghar and his cabinet ministers vowed to reject any peace plan that does not require Houthis to disarm and leave cities ahead of establishing a new governing body. Limited protests took place in some southern cities rejecting the new proposal, which Houthis are yet to respond to.
Some senior figures in the group however urged their leaders to reject the plan as it would defang their movement.
Comment: Hadi can do this because he is backed by his Saudi masters. Both do not want any peace agreement deserving this name. Hadi simply wants back to before-2014 times, being president – as autocratic as he ruled at that time – although his term already had expired for long. And the Saudis simply want the same; any peace agreement would mean a loss of influence. – As the Emirates have agreed to the peace plan, even hailed it, thie even more shows a rift between the Saudis and the Emirates in the case of Yemen.
Saudi Arabia, a theocratic absolute monarchy that carries out mass executions of dissidents, beheads drug dealers, systematically subjugates women and has supported extremist groups like al-Qaida and ISIS, was re-elected to the United Nations Human Rights Council on Friday.
Russia, however, was not. Croatia defeated it in a bid for re-election by just two votes.
The oil-rich Saudi monarchy has used its position on the council to systematically cover up its own egregious rights abuses. With the help of its Western allies, Saudi Arabia has blocked independent investigations into the war crimes it has committed in its ongoing bombing campaign in Yemen.
Saudi Arabia, in particular, has supported extremist Islamist rebels in Syria for years. The theocratic Saudi monarchy — which is based on a fundamentalist ideology known as Wahhabism, an ideology that is very similar to that of al-Qaida and ISIS — has spent billions of dollars helping to bankroll the CIA’s program to arm and train anti-government Syrian rebels, many of whom later joined or collaborated with al-Qaida or al-Qaida-linked groups.
Comment: Earlier reporting already YPR 220.
"More than 60 percent of Saudi Arabia's villages located along Saudi Arabia-Yemen border have been evacuated by the kingdom's border guards," the Arabic-language al-Ahad news website reported.
Lieutenant Commander of al-Arezeh Border Guards in Jizan Province Ali al-Amri said that the evacuation of the villages took place at the order of senior Saudi officials.
He reiterated that the Saudi border guards are doing their best to facilitate the evacuation of citizens from border villages.
Comment: There was reported sometimes ago that a great part of the population does not want to leave but is evacuated by force.
Comment: Saudi–US chumminess has many facets.
Comment: Nothing should surprise us any longer.
Comment: it seems whether the whole propaganda trying to pull anti-Iranian benefit from events in Yemen are a foreshadow of what is to come with Clinton as president.
Comment: It’s still much more. About 20 % of Clintons campaign had been sponsored by Saudi Arabia, as deputy crown prince Salman had said.
The Foreign Office has refused to deny whether it backed Saudi Arabia’s renewed membership on the UN’s Human Rights Council, despite alleged war crimes by the kingdom in Yemen.
It comes after a meeting of the UN General Assembly in New York elected 14 members to the council, including the oil-rich kingdom, through a secret ballot. The 193-member assembly also voted Russia off the UNHRC, which lost its regional seat to Hungary.
When asked whether the UK voted for Saudi Arabia, a Foreign Office spokesman told The Independent: “We do not reveal our voting intention”.
The Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron, told The Independent: “It is appalling that the UK would consider supporting any country as chair of the Human Rights Council which didn’t itself uphold fundamental human rights at home and abroad. Saudi Arabia in particular consistently disregard not only the rights of their own citizens, but have also been involved in serious violations of International Humanitarian Law in Yemen.
I'd like to apologise to my #Yemen-i friends for this tweet and the next 5 made by a UK member of parliament.
Labour MPs are embroiled in recriminations over the party’s failed motion to withdraw UK support from Saudi Arabia over the war in Yemen.
Around 100 Labour MPs were missing from Wednesday’s vote, which failed to pass by 283 votes to 193, and prompted the circulation online of lists of absent MPs. Emily Thornberry, shadow foreign secretary, later said she was “disappointed” in the actions of some of her colleagues.
While some on the Labour benches deliberately abstained on the vote, others claimed confusion over how seriously support for the motion was being whipped.
Dozens of Labour MPs were given authorisation from the whips to miss the vote, while many others say they were given indications that attendance on Wednesday afternoon was not paramount, and now feel unfairly targeted. As well as online pressure, several MPs have faced questions from local party members and constituents over the issue because they did not take part in the vote.
Thornberry said Wednesday’s motion was an opportunity to “send a message” that while Saudi Arabia will remain an “ally” in the region, the UK would suspend its support for Saudi forces in Yemen until “alleged violations” of international humanitarian law in the had been independently investigated.
“That would have been the right message to send to the rest of the world. That would have reflected what we should stand for as a country. And that is why I was so disgusted that all but one brave Tory MP voted against sending such a message and disappointed that some of my Labour colleagues abstained from doing so,” she said.
A crucial Corbyn-led vote was held in parliament on 26 October. And only around half of Labour MPs voted for it. The vote was cast on whether to halt support for, and therefore arms sales to, Saudi Arabia. And it happened just as the country is carrying out a brutal assault on Yemen, killing thousands of civilians.
In short, these ‘rebel’ Labour MPs have succeeded in ensuring the UK continues to be complicit in war crimes.
Jeremy Corbyn demanded the government commit to ending arms sales to Saudi Arabia at this week’s Prime Minister’s Questions, prior to the vote in parliament. Since the Saudi-led coalition began its offensive in Yemen, the UK had approved £2.8bn worth of arms sales to the kingdom as of April this year.
A UK-manufactured cluster bomb was discovered in Yemen by Amnesty International. And the UK government did not deny selling such weapons to Saudi Arabia; even though cluster bombs are illegal under international law.
Saudi Arabia has launched an attack on Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn after he urged the UK Government to scrap a £5.9m prison consultancy contract with the repressive Middle Eastern regime.
Writing in The Daily Telegraph, Mohammed bin Nawaf bin Abdulaziz, the Saudi ambassador to the UK, said there had been “an alarming change in the way Saudi Arabia is discussed in Britain” in the last few weeks.
He stressed his country’s importance to the UK, the security of the Middle East and its role as “the epicentre of Islam”, but noted this seemed to be “of little concern to those who have fomented this change”.
And he warned of “potentially serious repercussions that could damage the mutually beneficial strategic partnership that our countries have so long enjoyed” However he wrote: “One recent example of this mutual respect being breached was when Jeremy Corbyn, leader of the Opposition, claimed that he had convinced Prime Minister David Cameron to cancel a prison consultancy contract with Saudi Arabia worth £5.9m.
“This coincided with speculation linking the contract’s cancellation to a number of domestic events in the Kingdom.
“If the extensive trade links between the two countries are going to be subordinate to certain political ideologies, then this vital commercial exchange is going to be at risk.
Comment: This article by the Saudi ambassador tells a lot of Saudi psychology: We are allowed to do whatever we want, nobody might say anything against us.
Kommentar: Heuchelei im Quadrat. Würde der Westen, Deutschland eingeschlossen, seine Unterstützung für Saudi-Arabien einstellen, wäre der Krieg morgen vorbei.
Rheinmetall mordet im Jemen. Ich fordere eine Produkthaftung bei Kriegsverbrechen und das Ende der Straffreiheit für Waffenhersteller in Deutschland. Bombenhersteller müssen die Opfer ihrer Produkte finanziell entschädigen.
Kommentar: Geht leider kaum: Wenn Sie Ihrem Nachbarn ein Küchenmesser in den Bauch rammen, kann man auch nicht den Messerhersteller haftbar machen. Freilich dient das Küchenmesser eigentlich zum Brot- und Gemüseschneiden, mit Waffen kann man von Vorneherein nicht anderes machen als töten und zerstören. Das einzig moralisch Vertretbare ist und bleibt: Jede Waffenproduktion ist unmoralisch.
Während von ARD-aktuell fälschlich/unvollständig (wie in allen westlichen Medien) durchgehend über eine von Saudi-Arabien geführten Allianz arabischer Länder gegen den Jemen berichtet wird, sind demnach auch US-Amerikaner und Briten essentiell am Krieg gegen den Jemen beteiligt.
ARD-aktuell unterschlägt wesentliche Fakten über den Jemen-Krieg sowie Informationen über die Komplizenschaft/Mitwisserschaft der USA und Großbritanniens bei Völkerrechtsbruch und Kriegsverbrechen. Die Redaktion spielt insofern im publizistischen Bereich die gleiche transatlantische Vasallenrolle wie die Berliner Regierung im politischen Raum.
Another frenzy strike, #Sana'a under heavy bombardments now..
Breaking: huge explosion shook my windows, #Saudi jets all of a sudden hovering overheah #Sanaa, I can see new massacre on its way!!
Yeah, airstrikes were bloody sudden I almost choked on drink was having at moment.
Five members of a family, including their child, were killed when the Saudi barbaric aggression warplanes targeted their car driving on a public road in Razih district of Saada province overnight, a security official told Saba on Sunday.
A family, including three children, were killed when the Saudi barbaric planes hit the family's car in Serwah district of Marib province overnight, an official told Saba on Sunday.
The family: husband, his wife and their three children, were all killed and ripped through into parts and their car burned when the cowered warplanes targeted them.
The air strikes, in the meantime, launched a series of other strikes targeting the residents' houses and burned their farms.
Saudi aggression fighter planes waged three strikes on Hajr Kahlan school in Usylan district of Shabwa province overnight, an official told Saba on Sunday.
Saudi aggression war jets waged two strikes on al-Maslub district in Jawf province overnight, an official told Saba on Sunday.
The strikes targeted al-Sakaih and al-Salan areas in the same district, destroying citizens' houses and burning farms.
At least 27 civilians, mostly children and women, were killed on Saturday in three Yemeni provinces by airstrikes from a military coalition led by Saudi Arabia, officials and residents said.
Early Saturday morning, the Saudi-led air strikes hit residents' homes in two villages of al-Sharaf and Mabaran in al-Salo district of the southwestern province of Taiz, killing 10 villagers on the spot and flattering several mud-brick houses to the ground, according to the local officials and the residents.
The death tool later the day rose rapidly up to 17, mostly children and women, and seven others were fatally injured, said the officials and residents.
"The hospital receiving the injured lacked medicine and necessary equipment, so the death toll is more likely to increase in the next hours," a local official told Xinhua by phone.
In the far north province of Saada, officials and residents witnessed an airstrike targeting a car driving on a public road in Bani al-Sayyah area of Razih district on Saturday, killing a family of five members, including their infant.
The witnesses said the family was trying to flee the heavy air raids on the province, which is the stronghold of dominant Shiite Houthi movement.
In the central province of Marib, another family of five were all killed when the Saudi-led airstrike targeted their car in Habbab valley in east of the province on Saturday afternoon, local officials, residents and witnesses.
An official told Xinhua that the family was escaping the intensified air strikes on the villages and farms of Marib.
Local officials and residents also reported dozens of other air attacks on several regions across northern Yemeni provinces, most of the strikes burned farms and destroyed villagers' houses.
Dozens of cows and livestock of the villagers were also killed in the Saturday air strikes according to local authorities' reports to the agriculture ministry, a ministry official told Xinhua.
Comment by Judith Brown: News of more strikes over Yemen today by the Saudi coalition killing 27 civilians. In two of the air strikes families fleeing intensified strikes were killed in their cars. In one of these strikes in Marib the family was fleeing strikes on farms killing many cows. If the Labour Party in U.K. Had united against the conservative ruling party this week we could have stopped supplying weapons to them; the fact that Saudi was voted onto the human rights panel at the UN and UK Parliament did not stop their weapons supply means that they can act with Impunity. I am going to start sending a copy of all the deaths in Yemen to my MP every day.
US-backed Saudi aggression warplanes launched three air strikes on Khab and al-Sha`af district of Jawf province overnight, officials told Saba on Saturday.
The strikes caused horrifying destruction to citizens` houses and burned farms, the officials added.
Saudi aggression war jets launched nine strikes on Nehm district of Sanaa province overnight, a security official told Saba on Saturday.
US-backed Saudi aggression war jets launched six strikes on Bani Sad of al- Mahwit province overnight, an official told Saba on Saturday.
Saudi aggression war jets launched three strikes on Serwah district of Marib province overnight, an official told Saba on Saturday.
The final list of those killed at the Sanaa funeral attack, Oct. 8.
360° photo of the funeral hall in #Sanaa bombed by Saudi Coalition on 8 October.
A number of Saudi-paid top mercenaries commanders were killed in al-Salu front of Taiz province by the army and popular forces on Saturday, a military official told Saba.
3-commender Monir Mutahar Ali Aqlan al-Yousifi.
4-commender Awis Adnan Hazam Thabat Shamsan.
A number of Saudi-paid mercenaries were killed and others injured in an ambush carried out by the army and popular forces in Safr al-Hanaia area of al-Moton district in Jawf province, a security official told Saba on Saturday.
The artillery units of the army and popular forces hit gatherings of the US-backed Saudi-paid mercenaries in Usylan district of Shabwa province overnight, a military official told Saba on Saturday.
The army and popular forces recaptured al-Daif mountain in north of al-wazaia district of Taiz province on Saturday, securing the site from the US-backed Saudi-paid mercenaries, a military official told Saba.
The official said the army and popular forces secured the mountain from the mercenaries after fighting that resulted in the killing and injuring of dozens of them.
Fighting in Taiz has increased dramatically over the last few hours between Houthi militias and forces loyal to former President Ali Abdullah Saleh and the local resistance who are backed by the Yemeni national army, Asharq Al-Awsat newspaper reported.
Violent clashes erupted in a number of villages with deaths being reported on both sides.
“Similarly, violent confrontations took place … During these confrontations, the militias tried to advance on sites belonging to the army in the Asseeratayn area. However, army forces confronted them and forced them to retreat and flee,” the army source added.
Comment by Judith Brown: Well this road in Taiz still looks whole and uninjured. You can tell the bias of any article - there is bias in all directions - by the wording. This news outlet is usually pro Hadi and it talks about the newly recruited Saudi paid UAE trained army as 'The Yemen Army' - the original Yemeni army sided with the Houthis. Taiz is possibly the only city in Yemen that still has a section of people - but not all by any means - loyal to Hadi. But it is alarming to see the war is escalating in Taiz, as the Taiz people have been suffering a severe ground war for over a year. How much more can they take?
Comment: „president“ hadi and the saudi coalition odten lament fort he population of Taiz shelled by the Houthis. Well, they love them so much that they bombed them this day, causing 17 dead, see cp16.
As a consequence of the fighting between the Houthis, the Saudi led-coalition and al-Qaida, 20 journalists have died in Yemen since 2011, five of whom have been killed this year. In addition, 14 journalists remain detained by Houthis - and 1 by Al Qaida - and at least 9 have been tortured since 2015, according to IFJ latest figures.
Amid this conflict, which started early 2015, journalists have been accused by all the warring parties of affiliating with rival parties and serving their interest. As a result, reporters face the threats of being killed and tortured on a daily basis. As media houses were taken by the rebels, journalists have been forced to either leave or to follow their editorial line in an increasingly precarious and hostile atmosphere towards independent reporters.
The IFJ’s affiliate, the Yemen Journalists’ Syndicate (YJS), recently recorded over 100 cases of violation against journalists, photographers and dozens of newspapers and websites closed during the first six months of 2016. This includes 6 deaths, 11 cases of torture, 10 cases of attempted murder, 24 cases of abduction and detention, 12 cases of assault on journalists, media offices and private property, 13 cases of threats and incitement against journalists, 13 cases of blocking internal and external web sites, 7 cases of stopped salaries and dismissals and confiscation of journalist’s equipment and newspapers, and two trials.
The IFJ has mourned the death of five Yemeni journalists this year.
During the first campaign in 2012, he and fellow artists painted portraits of more than 100 people who've disappeared.