Even as Yemen is engulfed in its worst humanitarian crisis and conflict with the Saudi coalition, the Iran-backed Houthis have declared war against Israel over 1000 miles away. On Tuesday (31st October), Houthis claimed responsibility for the drone and missile attacks on Israel. With Houthis declaring war on Israel in support of the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas, Iran has been drawn an inch closer to entering the Israel-Hamas war. The development comes after Israel’s military informed that it shot down approaching “aerial targets” off the Red Sea city of Eilat.
In a televised statement released on Tuesday, Yahya Sarea, a spokesperson for the Houthis said, “Our armed forces launched a large batch of ballistic and cruise missiles at targets in occupied Palestine today, making it our third operation.”
Ironically, while the Houthi Islamists are waging a war against Israel, their own country Yemen is undergoing everyday worsening crisis and its people living in deplorable conditions. From conflict with the Saudi coalition to the widespread cholera epidemic, starvation and surging deaths, Yemen is facing adversity at all ends. Yet the Houthis have prioritised attacking a country 1300 miles away to extend support to their co-religionists in Palestine while their own people are living miserable lives. It is worth noting that the Houthis seized Yemen’s capital Sanaa in 2014 and control large swaths of the country.
Amidst the ongoing efforts for a potential ceasefire agreement between Houthis and a Saudi Arabia-led coalition comprising 8 Sunni majority nations including Kuwait, Morocco, Qatar, Sudan, Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Houthis recently killed four Saudi soldiers in Jazan province during a clash. Basically, regardless of the Yemeni civilians suffering perpetual adversities caused by the yearslong deadlock war, the cholera epidemic etc, the Iran-backed Islamist group has priortised annoying Saudi Arabia and on another front waging a war against Israel despite knowing that their offensive will invite retaliation from the Israeli forces.
With Houthi the attack on Israel at the Red Sea coast, the Israel-Hamas war extended to a third front. While the main battle is taking place in Gaza, Hezbollah is also targeting Israel from Lebanon on the north. And now, Israel has a new adversary at its southernmost point.
Humanitarian crisis in Yemen
According to a UNICEF report, over 23.4 million people including 12.9 million children are in dire need of humanitarian assistance and protection in Yemen this year. As has been ongoing for years, Yemen witnessed regular outbreaks of cholera, measles, diphtheria and many other diseases. The report adds that the Houthi-Saudi coalition conflict, large-scale displacement, and periodic climate shocks are all contributing to an accessory setting for infectious disease outbreaks. Over 17.8 million people, including 9.2 million children, lack access to adequate drinking water, sanitation, and hygiene services. Yemen’s health system is in shambles: barely half of health facilities are operational, leaving 21.9 million people without adequate health care.16 Nationally, immunisation coverage has plateaued, with 28% of children under the age of one not receiving vaccinations.
A ReliefWeb report says that Since March 2023, Yemen has recorded the second-highest number of measles cases in the world. This comes as Houthis continue to ban several vaccines including the measles vaccine in Northern Yemen.
It is notable that the Cholera outbreak in Yemen began in 2016 and over the years has persisted in the war-torn nation claiming thousands of lives. Between October 2016 to April 2021 alone 3997 cholera-related deaths were reported. Prior to this, in the year 2020, a UNICEF report warned that over 5 million children under the age of five in Yemen are facing a heightened threat of cholera and Acute Watery Diarrhoea (AWD).
In addition to Cholera, starvation has been another major issue in Yemen over the years. In a country like Yemen, there is plenty of guns, missiles, ammunition, bloodshed and destruction but no food for the people. According to a recently published World Food Programme (WFP) report, over 17 million Yemeni people are “food insecure”. This alarming figure has been recorded even when international agencies are providing humanitarian assistance to the country.
The WFP report outlined that child malnutrition in Yemen is among the highest in the world. Citing a recent survey, the report says that about one-third of Yemeni families have dietary gaps and rarely consume items like legumes, vegetables, fruit, dairy products, or meat. Yemen’s maternal and child malnutrition rates remain among the highest in the world, with 1.3 million pregnant and breastfeeding women and 2.2 million children under the age of five requiring treatment for acute malnutrition.
Although a UN-brokered truce last year did slightly bring down the intensity of the conflict in Yemen between Iran’s proxy Houthis and Saudi Arabia-led coalition, UNICEF reported in December last year that 11,000 children have now been killed or maimed as a result of the conflict in Yemen, an average of four a day since the conflict erupted in 2015.
Fighting the Kafirs is the bigger priority of Islamists than protecting the Muslims
Apparently, the hatred for Jews and Israel is more dear to the Houthi Islamists than ensuring that the people of Yemen live in peace and dignity. While their own citizens lead their lives in unimaginably terrible conditions, the Zaydi Shiite group has decided to fight its “axis of resistance” ally’s war owing to the religious imperative that the Houthis forget when it comes to the Yemeni people.
The “axis of resistance” is a loosely knit alliance of Sunni and Shia Muslim groups and governments in Yemen, Syria, Lebanon, Gaza, and Iraq, with varied degrees of affinity to one another and to Iran. While Houthis might have entered the Israel-Hamas war to consolidate its standing in the axis and also earn support and sympathy from Yemeni people for hostility towards Israel and the United States which is backing Israel in its war against the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas.
It is clear from the Houthis’ indifference to the plight of Yemen’s 99 percent Muslim population, as well as Hamas’ use of Gazan civilians as human shields, that waging a war against the Kafirs or infidels is more important to these Islamist terror groups than the lives of Muslims in their own country. The hatred that Islamist terror groups harbour towards infidels, particularly infidels of top order such as Jews, takes precedence above care and concern for Muslim men, women, and children. While Islamist terror groups use violence against infidels in the name of “resistance” and struggle for “self-rule,” they do not wish to bear the burden of government and responsibility.
A recent instance of this hypocrisy came from Hamas leader Abu Mazruk, who claimed in an interview that since refugees make up 75% of the population in the Gaza Strip, it is the UN and not Hamas that should bear the responsibility of protecting them.