UAE Troop Drawdown: Beginning of the End for Yemen War

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TEHRAN (FNA)- The United Arab Emirates has been forced to withdraw its occupying troops from Yemen in coordination with key ally Saudi Arabia. This should mark the beginning of the end for the failed US-backed, Saudi-led war on Yemen.

The UAE, a leading member of the Western-backed Arab coalition battling the Ansarullah movement, is reducing its military presence after almost five years of failed war on the poorest country in the Arab world. The Persian Gulf state has pulled many troops from areas including the Southern port of Aden and the Western coast, but claims it remains committed to the ousted government of president Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi.

The drawdown was not a last-minute decision and had been discussed extensively with Riyadh. It came after the failed attempt to defeat the resistance movement of Ansarullah amid international condemnations for the ongoing human rights violations and war crimes in the war-torn country by the Saudi-led coalition.

Indeed, behind the drawdown is a disastrous failure of decision-making that led to the war on Yemen in 2015; the signature initiative of the Crown Prince MBS. Thanks to his leadership, Saudi cities and infrastructure are now targets for a once-ragged army that has developed increasingly sophisticated drones and missiles. The war is the worst humanitarian catastrophe in the world.

The Trump administration’s decision to sell billions in arms to Riyadh without congressional approval has only encouraged the crown prince to continue the quagmire too. The Saudis are not more capable of winning the war with more munitions. The American support has singularly helped in five years to support the Saudis in bombing civilian targets or increasing the carnage of the war. Children are the most at risk and are paying a horrible cost.

On the other hand, the war on Yemen has exposed the tenuous nature of Saudi Arabia’s relationships with its principal Muslim allies. The most important of them, Pakistan, surprisingly refused to send its army to assist the regime. The Sisi government in Egypt also refused to send large numbers of ground troops to participate in the fighting. Instead, Cairo sent a small contingent of several hundred soldiers and three to four ships to assist Riyadh.

And in recent instances, even those countries that agreed to participate in the Saudi-led campaign developed conflicts of interest with Riyadh over the course of the fighting; for example, the Saudis and the Emiratis are backing forces that are at odds over the future of Yemen and this has created friction that has at times erupted into violence between local actors.

In the prevailing environment, expect the Saudi coalition fighting in Yemen to be forced more into a stalemate following the UAE’s decision. Riyadh and Abu Dhabi had promised a swift campaign in what has now become one of the fiercest battles in the devastating conflict. Their initially stated goal was a total defeat of Ansarullah in Yemen, but after a couple of years they changed their claim, and said their goal is to cut off the Ansarullah’s main supply line and force them back to the North. However, little progress has been made since the campaign was launched, as the country is heavily defended by land and sea.

Last but not the least, the Saudi coalition’s inability to win or even to advance in Yemen has a two-pronged diagnosis: The fact that the Ansarullah are well-situated to repel foreign fighting forces; and the fact that the Saudi military suffers from its own systemic ineffectiveness and divisions – for instance, the UAE’s failed efforts to bring its power to bear in the fight war and its recent decision to withdraw. 

Which is to say: The illegal war on Yemen has been a disaster for all involved parties, and so ending it is both the smart thing to do as well as the right thing to do under international law and UN Charter. And because American interference is most successful in regions that suffer from conflict or insecurity, ending the war has the added benefit of potentially weakening the War Party’s ability to meddle in regional affairs.

TEHRAN (FNA)- Flash floods, heavy downpours and adverse weather conditions continue to wreak havoc in many parts of Iran, forcing massive evacuations and putting a lot of pressure on rescue and relief operations.

In many rural communities, hundreds of people have been trapped and cut off by violent torrents of water. The Army, the IRGC and Basij volunteer forces are using many armored personnel carriers in order to speed up rescue operations in these inundated areas where road vehicles cannot be used.

The Air Force has also deployed its assets in places where heavy rains and strong winds have caused major damage to buildings and cars, as well as in other parts of the country. This is while emergency alerts and evacuation orders have been issued in several provinces and officials have warned of imminent flooding.

The Iran Meteorological Organization has warned that a new low-pressure system is expected to enter the country as early as Thursday, which means heavy downpours could once again cause the average level of rainfall in some parts of the country to more than triple during the weekend.

Just like any other place in the world, international aid efforts could make a huge impact on the ground for those who are still suffering, who are homeless, and at risk of new flash floods. The only problem is that Iran is under unilateral sanctions by the United States and this has made it impossible for other nations to come to Iran’s assistance at its darkest hour.

This has forced Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif to condemn the United States for waging “economic terrorism” against the Islamic Republic by employing such restrictive measures that are troubling the relief efforts targeting flood-stricken people across the country.

In his words, “The sanctions are impeding aid efforts by Iranian Red Crescent to all communities devastated by unprecedented floods. Blocked equipment includes relief choppers. This isn't just economic warfare; it's economic terrorism.”

As such, the economic restrictions on humanitarian efforts are in broad violence of the United Nations Security Council Resolution 2231 and the International Criminal Court of Justice ruling, which have both called on Washington to lift its illegal sanctions against Iran.

The ICJ, the UN’s principal judicial organ, has ordered in response to a lawsuit filed by Iran that the United States has to halt the unilateral sanctions it has re-imposed on "humanitarian" supplies. Washington’s refusal to relieve its bans flouts the fundamental norms of international law and international humanitarian law.

The Trumpsters should hold their heads in shame because this comes as countrywide flooding, unleashed by heavy downpours on Iran since March 19, has killed scores of people and has pushed relief and rescue organizations to the utmost.

This should stun no one. A just, rules-based global order has long been touted by the United States as essential for international peace and security. Indeed, there is a long history of Washington flouting international law while using it against other states.

The bans on humanitarian relief efforts is further evidence that the US has every intention to show contempt for international law. There is a long list just for the past 15 years – the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq without UN Security Council mandates, the overthrow of Muammar Qaddafi’s regime through aerial bombardment, the aiding of a still-raging bloody insurrection in Syria, and the ongoing US-backed, Saudi-led war on Yemen.

The US has refused to join a host of critical international treaties – ranging from the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea to the 1998 International Criminal Court Statute. Now its policy of unilateral sanctions on humanitarian goods destined to the flood-hit areas of Iran mocks international law.

In this light, is it any surprise that the US’s moral authority and international standing have eroded? Is it any surprise that the US is still devaluing international institutions?

War on Yemen: It’s Now About Snatching Food Aid from the Starving

TEHRAN (FNA)- The outrageous Saudi-led war on Yemen is all about starving a nation and stealing its riches, where Western aid is eclipsed by the billions brought in through the bungling, deceitful sale of weapons to Saudis and their allies.

While the world celebrates the New Year, report after report reveal that amid famine and rampant disease, food aid pouring in from across the globe, meant to curb the world's worst humanitarian crisis, is in fact "being snatched from the starving" by armed forces allied with the US-backed, Saudi-led coalition.

The warmongers block food aid from going to the besieged areas, divert it to front-line combat units, or sell it for profit on the black market. The United Nations and observers on the ground attribute the near-famine conditions in much of the country to the Saudi blockade of ports.

The UN World Food Program says it has already documented food aid diversion "at a time when children are dying in Yemen because they haven't enough food to eat; that is an outrage." Save the Children also says some 85,000 children under age five have starved to death since the brutal war began.

This shouldn’t happen at a time when peace talks and a ceasefire agreement are still in place. The talks in Sweden have led to a reduction in fighting and this should ease the challenges of getting food aid into and out of Hodeida, the port city that is a gateway to the north. Donors should be able to get more food in. But here is the smell of blood still:

- The futile bombing campaign continues apace. The Saudis and their allied forces have been killing around a hundred civilians a week for more than three years now. The harshest criticism of the Saudi-led war has focused on the airstrikes that have killed thousands of civilians at weddings, funerals and on school buses, aided by American-supplied bombs and intelligence. The war in Yemen has killed upwards of 57,000 people since March 2015, left 8.4 million people surviving on food aid and created a cholera epidemic.

- International aid experts and United Nations officials say a more insidious form of warfare is also being waged in Yemen, an economic war that is exacting a far greater toll on civilians and now risks tipping the country into a famine of catastrophic proportions.

- The punitive economic measures are allegedly aimed at undercutting the Ansarullah fighters who control vast parts of Yemen. Tight blockades, stringent import restrictions and withholding the salaries of about a million civil servants have landed on the backs of civilians, laying the economy to waste and driving millions deeper into poverty.

- Infrastructure destroyed, jobs lost, a weakening currency and soaring prices are the clear results. But in recent weeks the economic collapse has gathered pace at alarming speed, causing top United Nations officials to revise their predictions of famine.

- The US government has been the key supporter of the Saudi-led coalition, providing arms, intelligence, logistics, military training and diplomatic cover. This has made the Trump administration complicit in Saudi war crimes. More recently, an attempt to push through a UN resolution calling for an end to the war was stalled by the US, reportedly after a lobbying campaign by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

- The US government claims to have one of the most rigorous arms control regimes in the world, yet evidence of attacks on medical facilities and schoolchildren in Yemen is clear. War is the primary cause of death, injury, famine and disease in Yemen; and American arms are causing twice as many civilian casualties as all other forces fighting.

Sadly, the UN is yet to hold the Saudis and their American partners to account. They bear primary responsibility for Yemen’s humanitarian disaster. They are attacking civilians, aid and humanitarian actors, and attempts to disavow their responsibility for war crimes simply don’t stand up. The time has come for the UN and the international civil society to call for an embargo on Saudi Arabia and an end to Washington’s complicity and deceit.

US Blocks Vote Ending Yemen War: When International Law Fails, Civilians Suffer

TEHRAN (FNA)- American political leaders on Capitol Hill are at it again. They have blocked a vote to wind down US military support for the Saudi-led war on Yemen.

The measure narrowly passed with a 201-187 vote, making it more difficult for the House to take action on the war on Yemen with legislative action. What’s more, several of the co-sponsors of the Yemen resolution to end the war either voted to advance the bill or abstained from the vote entirely, meaning they played a part in preventing their own bill from reaching the House floor.

This comes at a time when Yemen’s popular forces of Ansarullah seek truce and are ready for ceasefire ahead of Sweden peace talks. Following the UN announcement of upcoming peace talks, the resistance movement has announced that they want a truce with the Saudi-led forces. Mohammed Ali al-Houthi, the group’s leader, says they decided to halt the strikes amid requests from the UN to support the peace effort. The Saudi-led invaders have also said they support talks, and ordered their own ceasefire.

But this was only in words. Saudi Arabia and its allies are now launching new offensives in the Northwest, which suggests their previously announced ceasefire was overstated. Saudi Arabia’s so-called ceasefire in the vital Yemeni aid port of Hodeida has also come to an end after a brief lull in fighting. Now, Saudi warplanes are again pounding the city, and Saudi-backed forces are again carrying out offensives in and around the suburbs.

This is unfortunate. The ceasefire didn’t last up to the peace talks, and the Saudis and their American-British weapons suppliers are not willing to end the unnecessary conflict – Ansarullah truce and ceasefire announcement notwithstanding. This is not a good sign for the upcoming peace talks, though they may also represent an attempt to secure some last-minute gains before coming to the negotiating table. Either way, renewed Saudi airstrikes in Hodeida is doubtless to mean another upswing in civilian casualties, further blockade of the vital port city, and worsened humanitarian crisis that has affected at least 12 million people.

Also don’t believe it when the US military claims it has discontinued refueling Saudi warplanes bombing Yemen. The Congress has just voted to continue the conflict while the US military continues to play a pivotal role in the war, providing arms and logistical support to UAE and Saudi forces occupying Yemen, blockading the country’s ports, and bombing its civilians.

Lest we forget, The UNHCR’s investigation has already concluded that there are “reasonable grounds” to conclude that the US-backed, Saudi blockade violates the proportionality rule of international humanitarian law. Under that convention, the blockade is illegitimate because its impact on civilians is disproportionate to its military benefits. The advocacy group Human Rights Watch has also called on the UN Security Council to impose travel bans and asset freezes on Saudi Arabia and its coalition leaders, including Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman.

In the prevailing circumstances, it is silly for Saudi Arabia to claim that by blockading the port city they only aim to prevent the Houthi Ansarullah forces from receiving arms shipments from Iran. There is no way Iran could possibly send weapons and missiles into the country as it is completely under siege from air, land and sea. Besides, the resistance forces have the knowledge and the technology to make their own missiles that can easily target at the Saudi capital Riyadh.

In any event, the Saudis can only continue the illegal war and blockade with the much-needed military and diplomatic support they get from the United States. The good news is that several European countries like Germany have decided to suspend arms exports to Saudi Arabia and its fighting partner the United Arab Emirates. Norway has also ceased such sales to the UAE. However, the US and UK still support the Saudi-led coalition with weapons sales and logistical help. As long as such complicity in Saudi war crimes is there, the Ansarullah offer of truce and ceasefire will get nowhere. In consequence, the humanitarian crisis affecting millions of people will only continue to grow as the conflict rages on, and those in need will be prevented from receiving lifesaving assistance.

As is often the case, there is no military solution to the unnecessary conflict. The United Nations should call on Saudi Arabia and its partners to immediately end arms supplies, stop the airstrikes, and allow room for the new UN-led peace process in Sweden to take place in order to avoid further humanitarian catastrophe. After all, the protection of civilians and civilian infrastructure in Yemen is an essential provision of international law. When these laws fail, civilians suffer.

Long List of Saudi War Crimes in Yemen

Clown Prince’s US and UK coalition rack up war crimes

By Yusuf Dhia-Allah

The Saudi-led war on Yemen has now gone on for more than 42 months. The so-called Arabian coalition that the Saudis had assembled to subdue Yemen has all but melted away with the exception of the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Sudan and Jordan abandoned the war and have slunk away. Others such as Pakistan and Egypt had more sense not to get involved at all. The Saudis are now relying increasingly on the US and Britain for air refueling, target selection, and logistical support.

They have also turned to mercenaries from South America and Africa to prosecute the ground war. There are mercenaries from Colombia and Senegal as well as Blackwater operatives. Additionally, the Saudis are relying increasingly on al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula to help them fight the Ansarallah fighters.

After three and a half years of a relentless bombing campaign, the Saudis are nowhere near achieving any of their military or political objectives. The war has exposed Saudi incompetence on a grand scale even if they have caused massive civilian casualties and inflicted immense infrastructure damage.

Let us first consider what their military and political objectives were. The Saudis launched their war on March 26, 2015. The announcement was made not in Riyadh but in Washington, DC. ‘Adil al-Jubayr who served as Saudi ambassador to the US at the time and is rumored to be gay, made the announcement at the Kingdom’s embassy in Washington, DC. This was a clear signal that the war had America’s blessings (al-Jubayr currently serves as Saudi foreign minister while Khalid bin Salman, the king’s young son, is ambassador to the court of King Donald Trump!).

The Saudis thought they would easily and quickly crush the Houthi-backed Ansarallah fighters — who had liberated Sana‘a, the Yemeni capital — and reinstall their puppet ‘Abd Rabbu Manßur Hadi. He had already fled the capital and sought refuge in Riyadh. Hadi was installed in power after the Saudis forced the former long-time president ‘Ali ‘Abdullah Salih to resign. Salih was summoned to Riyadh in February 2012 and ordered by then Saudi King ‘Abdullah to sign a paper confirming his resignation (Salih was killed in a Saudi air strike last year).

The Saudis have made a habit of summoning foreign rulers to Riyadh and ordering them to resign. The latest example of this was the Lebanese Prime Minister Sa‘d Hariri who underwent a similar experience in November 2017 only to reappear in Beirut via France saying he was withdrawing his resignation.

Salih’s February 2012 resignation, however, did not improve the situation in Yemen as far as the Saudis are concerned. With the Ansarallah fighters making steady gains against Hadi’s forces and taking over Sana‘a in 2014 (that they still control), the Saudis were forced to get involved directly. This occurred soon after King ‘Abdullah died and was succeeded by half-brother, Salman in January 2015.

Salman immediately appointed his young and reckless son Muhammad as defence minister and also gave him charge of court affairs (court secretary controlling access to the king). Muhammad bin Salman (MbS as he is commonly known) thought he would establish his credentials as a warrior prince by attacking dirt-poor Yemen, which he thought he would subdue in a matter of weeks, if not sooner.

While the old King Salman concentrated more and more power in the hands of his impetuous son, first making him deputy crown prince and then elevating him to the position of crown prince, he also made him in charge of Aramco and the Kingdom’s overall economic policy. Bin Salman has made a mess of everything. Apart from making grandiose pronouncements, he has achieved little of substance. The economy is not doing too well; foreign workers have been forced to leave and the war on Yemen has gone nowhere even if it has resulted in the killing of thousands of innocent people as well as the starvation of millions of others.

It is being called the “worst humanitarian crisis in the world”: nearly 80% of Yemen’s population is food insecure; millions are now enduring a famine. The situation has grown even worse since late-2017, when Saudi Arabia enacted a near-complete blockade on its borders with Yemen, making it nearly impossible for anyone to import food, water, and medical supplies. In addition to the humanitarian crisis, Yemen is facing an environmental catastrophe. Nearly 90% of the country is classified as arid or desert. Water was already scarce, but now with the war raging with no end in sight, what little agriculture the poor country had will no longer be feasible.

Here are some grim statistics about Yemen that are the direct result of the Saudi-led war. Since the Saudis and their allies have imposed a tight siege on Yemen preventing food and desperately needed medicines, a cholera epidemic rages in the country that the UN has called the worst epidemic in history. More than one million children are affected. On September 18, the British charity, Save the Children said at least 5.2 million Yemeni children faced starvation as a result of Saudi attacks on Hudaydah, the only entry point for food into the country that is not controlled by Saudi allied forces.

So far more than 13,000 Yemenis, mostly civilians, have been killed and several hundred thousand injured. The UN estimates that 22.3 million of Yemen’s 24 million people are food deficient and on the verge of starvation, “The conflict has made Yemen a living hell for its children,” Meritxell Relano, Unicef Representative in Yemen, said on September 13. She further revealed that more than 11 million children, or about 80% of the country’s population under the age of 18, were facing the threat of food shortages, disease, displacement, and acute lack of access to basic social services.

“An estimated 1.8 million children are malnourished in the country. Nearly 400,000 of them are severely acute malnourished and they are fighting for their lives every day,” said Ms. Relano.

Frustrated by lack of progress on the military front, the Saudis have resorted to indiscriminate bombing of civilian areas. Factories, hospitals, schools, markets, and homes have been bombed and destroyed. Even funeral processions have not been spared. And in a more recent outrage, on August 9, the Saudis fired a missile at a school bus killing 40 children instantly and injuring many others in Yemen’s northern Sadaa province.

Most Saudi attacks constitute war crimes and Bin Salman could be hauled before a war crimes tribunal to face war crime charges one day. As the Kingdom’s defence minister and de facto ruler, he is personally and directly responsible for such crimes.

As a result of Saudi war crimes, several European countries have cancelled weapons contracts with the Saudis. These include Sweden, Germany, and Norway. They have all said they would not supply weapons to a regime that may be committing war crimes. Still, other major arms suppliers like the US, Britain, and France continue to sell weapons to the Bedouins.

Even two-bit player Canada is in on the act and is supplying $15 billion worth of weapons. The deal was signed by the former Conservative regime of Stephen Harper in 2014 but the “sunny ways” Liberal government of Justin Trudeau has not seen fit to cancel the deal despite growing calls within Canada to do so. There have been protests in different cities demanding cancellation of the deal. The most recent one was held on September 8 outside the Toronto constituency office of Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland. Canadian media outlets have also carried detailed reports about the Kingdom’s gross human rights abuses.

So far Ottawa has not canceled the arms deal even though the Bedouins reacted angrily to a tweet from Ms. Freeland that was mildly critical of Saudi mistreatment of female human rights activists. The Bedouins thought they would make an example of Canada seeing it as a soft target. This was an opportunity for Canada to stand up for its principles but it failed.

Such failure will cost Canada dearly. The Saudis have failed to win the war in Yemen; the regime is facing internal opposition and its economy is rapidly declining. These are signs of an impending collapse.

Time to Banish Banu Saud

MBS: a danger to all Muslims, but not billionaires

By Yusuf Dhia-Allah

The Bani-Saud clan is made up of an assortment of criminals and gangsters. Were Islamic law applied judicially and fairly, there would not be a single member of the clan left with his head over his shoulders much less a safe pair of hands. Their misdemeanors are not only individual but also collective, causing immense damage to the Ummah. Here is only a short list:

1. Illegal occupation of the Haramayn and arbitrary decision to bar some Muslims from performing Hajj or restricting pilgrims from some countries — Syria, Qatar, etc. — with whom Bani Saud are at war or loggerheads. Additionally, the arbitrary quota system imposed for decades and the artificially exorbitant prices prevent millions of Muslims from performing Hajj.

2. The Saudi-led war on Yemen launched on March 26, 2015 has resulted in tens of thousands of deaths and millions of Yemenis on the verge of starvation. Among them are an estimated 8.5 million children. One million children are suffering from cholera, described by the United Nations as the worst epidemic in human history. Of the 24 million Yemenis, 22 million are food deficient, again the direct result of the Saudi-led siege.

3. The Saudi regime’s seven-year war on Syria has devastated the country and left more than 500,000 people dead. Nearly half of Syria’s population has become refugees. Equally disastrous has been the unleashing of takfiri terrorists who have indulged in gruesome beheadings, organ eating, and rape. They have perpetrated these crimes using the name of Islam, thus tarnishing its message and values. Syria has been left in ruins and would take decades and at least $250 billion to rebuild.

4. Bani Saud have now openly joined the Zionists and imperialists to betray the decades-long struggle of the Palestinian people. They have bought into the diabolical US-Zionist plot to force the Palestinians to live as slaves of the Zionists in Bantustans on their own land.

5. The Najdi Bedouins are guilty of instigating hatred against other Muslims with whom they have fiqhi differences unleashing demonic forces that have gone on a rampage killing thousands of innocent people. This hatred has assumed an extreme form and will take decades to overcome.

6. Internally, Muhammad bin Salman, the de facto ruler, has unleashed a reign of terror to silence all opponents, real or imagined, to his power grab. He has enforced this through large-scale arrests of prominent members of the royal family, businessmen and the clergy, especially those seen as not sufficiently deferential to the punk prince. At the same time, public beheadings have increased, clearly intended to terrorize any would-be critic into silence.

7. The policy of terror has gone hand in hand with lifting some restrictions on social mores. Women have been given the right to drive even while women activists are arrested. The Western media, their palms appropriately greased and bank balances fattened, have gone into overdrive to drumbeat about the “moderate” prince’s reforming zeal. Gambling casinos have opened up where even the court clergy are seen throwing the dice or spinning the wheel! And plans are afoot to open beaches where women can wear bikinis and booze would be plentiful. Bin Salman (BS) calls this modernization; others have dubbed it vulgarity. The policy of vulgarity is meant to create the impression the modernizing prince is catching up with time. The message is: go enjoy yourselves but do not interfere in politics or ask for any say in policy matters. These had better be left in the grubby hands of the king-in-waiting.

An artist’s impression of the leading figures in a billionaires’ rogues gallery who don’t bat an eye when millions of the weak and hungry are murdered, displaced, or impoverished.

Leading religious figures not sufficiently deferential to BS have landed in jail. These include Shaykh Salman al-‘Awdah (imprisoned since last September) and Shaykh ‘A’id al-Qarni. Another prominent salafi shaykh, Safar al-Hawali, 68, who is in poor health, was also detained last month. Together with al-‘Awdah, al-Hawali belongs to the Sahwah (awakening) movement and is a critic of US policies. The two came to prominence in the 1990s when they opposed the deployment of hundreds of thousands of US troops in the Kingdom on the eve of the US attack on Iraq. Both were detained and held in prison accused of inciting public disorder.

If Shaykh al-‘Awdah believes in Islamic governance based on the constitution that may be considered heresy by Bani Saud and the crown princeling, al-Hawali is closely tied to the Wahhabi ideology. So what has aroused Bin Salman’s ire against him? Independent thinking is not permitted in the medieval Kingdom. It is seen as a threat to Bin Salman’s grip on power. He is working to establish one-man rule in the Kingdom.

While clamping down hard at home, Bin Salman has surrendered completely to the imperialists and Zionists. During his visit to the US last March when Bin Salman met US President Donald Trump the latter said, “…they [the Saudis] have hundreds of billions of dollars. They will give them to us. They understand this.” The clear implication was, if you don’t cough up, you are out. Trump is nobody’s friend; he has publicly insulted his closest allies including Justin Trudeau of Canada, Angela Merkel of Germany, and Teresa May of Britain. Why would Trump care for a Bedouin from the desert smelling of camel dung?

Unlike any other country, the Arabian Peninsula is important to all Muslims because it houses the two holy cities of Makkah and Madinah (jointly called the Haramayn). These do not belong to Bani Saud; they are invaders from Najd and alien to the land (the Hijaz) and ethos of Islam. Their continued occupation of the Haramayn poses a clear and present danger to Islam and the Muslims.

The sooner Bani Saud are banished from the Holy Land, the better for all Muslims. This should be treated with the same seriousness as the continued Zionist colonization of al-Quds. The two — Bani Saud and Bani Israel — are two faces of the same coin. They cannot be allowed to remain in power in either of the Holy Lands.

Yemen War: Trial Time for Saudi Arabia?

Saudi Arabia is fast approaching trial time on its illegal war on Yemen, as the international humanitarian community will soon have to respond against them. This includes the United Nations and the International Criminal Court in The Hague.

While the United Nations and the international civil society insist they want a peaceful resolution to the worst humanitarian crisis in the 21st century, Riyadh dismisses the idea of diplomacy in the assessment, saying they wouldn’t be willing to bargain away their stated goal, which is regime change in Sana’a.

However, since many people are dying and the country is facing famine, there is no time in which the Saudis and their allies can threaten Yemen any further. Simply put, Yemen is dying and time is almost here. There is an increasing rate of civilian casualties. According to the UN aid agencies, the upsurge in fighting is of particular concern. Civilians are under fire, as Saudi-led forces carry out airstrikes and indiscriminate bombing, without taking care to spare the civilian population, much less respecting the principles of distinction, proportionality and precaution.

This is while any intentional, direct attack against civilians or civilian objects is considered a serious violation of International Humanitarian Law and the UN Charter. The warmongers refuse to take any feasible precautions to avoid, or in any event, minimise, the impact of violence on civilians. And that’s when it’s safe to conclude that the UN and the International Criminal Court in the Hague will have to step in to stop the protracted conflict and hold to account those who want this crisis to continue apace – one way or another:

– It is true that in the wake of unlawful US-backed, Saudi-led bombing, some Western governments have decided to suspend the sale of weapons worth tens of billions of dollars to Saudi Arabia. It is a recognition, a long time in coming, that the Saudi-led coalition’s military campaign in Yemen have devastated the country, killed thousands of civilians and brought it to the brink of famine. However, unlawful airstrikes still continue, which means the decision by some Western governments to suspend arms sales has sent no message to the Saudis. US President Donald Trump, in his first trip to Riyadh for instance, sent an alternative, deeply troublesome message. He sold American weapons to the Saudis worth $110 billion – nearly as much as President Obama authorized during his eight years in office.

– The deals include Raytheon bombs, Lockheed Martin missile defense systems and BAE combat vehicles, and some of the weapons whose sales had been suspended. Thanks to these weapons, the scars of unlawful airstrikes can be found across Yemen, where the Saudi-led coalition has carried out scores of attacks that hit homes, schools, markets, and hospitals since March 2015, when it began its military campaign against the Ansarullah resistance movement and forces loyal to the former President Ali Abdullah Saleh.

– Human Rights Watch has documented numerous unlawful coalition attacks over the last three years, many war crimes. In many of these cases, including the attacks on funeral halls and markets, the organization’s investigators were able to identify the US weapons that were used. These are the very same weapons that continue to drive Yemen, already the poorest nation in the Middle East, toward humanitarian catastrophe.

– Both the Saudi-led coalition and their American allies have blocked or restricted critical relief supplies from reaching civilians. Seven million people face starvation and cholera ravages parts of the country. The UN should be urging the Saudis to shift course by abiding by the laws of war and holding those responsible for past abuses to account.

– Without Washington’s much-needed support and consent this war can never continue. By going to Riyadh to sell the Saudis weapons worth over $110 billion, President Donald Trump effectively told them to continue as before and not to worry about any international backlash at the UN – the flow of US weapons would not stop. This makes the US government complicit in Saudi war crimes. Continued US arms sales to a country that has repeatedly violated the laws of war expose US officials to legal liability for aiding and abetting Saudi war crimes.

It is against this backdrop and others that the UN and The Hague should step in, introducing a resolution intended to end the US-backed, Saudi-led war on Yemen. The resolution should end US arms transfers to Saudi Arabia, as requiring the White House to certify that the Saudi-led coalition is taking all feasible precautions to minimize civilian casualties is not going to mean anything at all – let alone end the human suffering there.

The UN and the International Criminal Court in The Hague are in the know that the people of Yemen can take no more and that they need to react fast. Innocent people are suffering from unlawful airstrikes because the US supports the Saudi-led coalition and because US weapons have been used against civilian populations. This is an international legal problem the UN and the ICC should be paying more attention to. If they won’t try to curtail the ongoing Us-backed war crimes by Saudi Arabia and the rest of the coalition, no other world body would ever step in to make clear – by using its own power to end the war – that the lives of Yemeni civilian can no longer be disregarded.