While we’re all enjoying 2019 with all our friends and families, people in Yemen are still struggling to survive against the war on their country.
With its bombs and missiles, this war has brought immense fear to our lives. We live under constant threat, we are socially unstable, our chance of education is dead, and our country is politically insecure and economically broken.
We are never free of anxiety.
Hadil’s words are felt by so many of Yemen’s families who’ve had their lives destroyed by years of war. There have been over 60,000 Yemenis killed in the course of the three years. Over 20 million people face hunger and starvation, and approximately 85,000 children under 5 years old have died of diseases or malnutrition since March 2015. In a country torn apart by war, poverty and hunger, suicide can be seen as the only option. Even before the war started, Yemen was already struggling with employment and poverty and the war just continues to push more people towards death, and even with the constant aid going into Yemen, it has not done a lot to improve their lives or their agony. The people of Yemen lead such horrific lives, they often commit suicide before their hunger gets to them.
In “Arms Sales to Saudis Leave American Fingerprints on Yemen’s Carnage,” which is an article written on the involvement of the United States in the war of Yemen, they talk about how America is complicit with Saudi Arabia, and haven’t done much to help Yemenis, to say at the very least.
“When a Saudi F-15 warplane takes off from King Khalid air base in southern Saudi Arabia for a bombing run over Yemen, it is not just the plane and the bombs that are American,” wrote authors Declan Walsh and Eric Schmitt. “American mechanics service the jet and carry out repairs on the ground. American technicians upgrade the targeting software and other classified technology, which the Saudis are not allowed to touch. The pilot has likely been trained by the United States Air Force. And at a flight operations room in the capital, Riyadh, Saudi commanders sit near American military officials who provide intelligence and tactical advice.”
In The New York Times, David Kirkpatrick exposed Saudi Arabia for enlisting young children from the Darfur region of Sudan as mercenaries to fight their war. They offered the families of the Sudanese children about $10,000 to join the forces fighting in Yemen. The New York Times assumes about 20-40% of the forces were children, as young as 10-17 years old. The government of Saudi Arabia and their allies have shown their indifference to human lives, time and time again.
The heartbreaking fate of the people in Yemen– or as the United Nations calls it “The World’s Worst Humanitarian Crisis” can be helped by donating to the Islamic Relief USA or Canada, or the Baitumaal Fund, however, the grim reality of the Yemenis will only truly improve once the war on them comes to an end.
Photo: Hani Mohammed
