Airstrikes in Yemen Continue Despite Calls for Ceasefire
By: Jonathan Stormer Pezzi
A woman in a burqa walks the streets in Yemen. Photo by kate nev
New York — Despite calls for ceasefire in response to COVID-19, Yemen’s capital city, Sana’a, was rocked by airstrikes this week. The Saudi-led coalition reportedly fired a flurry of missiles at the city south of their border in retaliation to a previous attack by Houthi rebels the weekend prior. The missiles fired by the Houthis were intercepted by Saudi air defenses, inflicting no damage on the Kingdom.
In retaliation to the attempt, the Saudis, their allies, and the internationally-recognized government in Yemen targeted a military college controlled by the Houthis.
The attack had a small number of human casualties, however, 70 purebred Arabian horses were killed when a missile hit the stables. 30 other horses were injured and will likely succumb to the trauma. Pictures of the aftermath have sparked international outrage.
People have voiced their condemnation throughout social media.
In the midst of the Arab Spring, Yemen’s president of two decades, Ali Abdullah Saleh, stepped down following nationwide protests. Despite Saleh’s departure, the country descended into civil war as competing forces jockeyed for power. Since the war began in 2015, over 100,000 people have been killed, many of those civilians.
Prior to Saudi Arabia’s intervention, the Houthis were on a clear path to victory, controlling much of the country’s populated territory. However, within months of Saudi Arabia, the UAE and their allies joining the conflict, the coalition pushed the Houthis back to their homeland in the country's north.
The rebels are now closing in, pushing the coalition-backed government into a final stronghold. Despite the substantial financial support from Saudi Arabia and American supplied arms, the Houthis have retaken the momentum in the war.
“There is a feeling of growing instability….which makes everything far more unpredictable and uncontrollable, with a heightened risk of miscalculation,” said UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres in a statement last month about the escalating conflicts in the Middle East.
Many fear the Coronavirus pandemic will hit Yemen especially hard, as the country’s civilian population has been rocked by public health crises in the last several years.
Yemen saw one of the worst outbreaks of Cholera in the world, according to Doctors Without Borders, reaching over one million cases countrywide. Other diseases such as Dengue Fever and Malaria have plagued the nation as well, with malaria holding an endemic status and dengue infecting over 30,000 people as of November of last year. It is possible the numbers are far higher due to the difficulty of gathering information in conflict areas or those cutoff by poor infrastructure.
While Secretary General Antonio Guterres’s call for a global ceasefire during the pandemic has potentially had some effect in countries like Cameroon, there has been no public discussion of ending the violence in order to fight the coronavirus in Yemen. However, despite a recent uptick in violence, peace talks between Saudi Arabia and the rebels have occurred in recent weeks, implicating some form of deal may be on the horizon.