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War on Yemen Continues, Without End in Sight, With Heavy Losses

August 21, 2018 

Yemeni children

 

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The following news stories are from the Yemeni pro-Saudi website Al-Sahwa ( http://www.alsahwa-yemen.net/  ):

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Thirty-one CSOs demand breakthrough in Houthi siege on Taiz city

8/21/2018 1:25:00 AM الصحوة نت - خاص

As many as 31 Yemeni civil society organizations (CSOs) have joined voices of appeal to the international community to force a breakthrough in the years long Houthi siege against the central Yemen city of Taiz.

In a statement on Sunday, the CSOs called on the UN organizations to force the Houthis to open some outlets for the flow of basic food stuff and medical provision into the city. "For four years, the people of Taiz have been suffering a siege and a day-to-day suffering as a result of the closure of the main roads that link Taiz with other provinces. This producted the worst living conditions a Yemeni city has ever suffered since the beginning of the war," read the statement.

The CSOs called on "the UN Secretary General's Special Envoy Martin Griffiths to use all means of pressure to open the main roads in Taiz and guarantee the safety of movement of people and transportation of food into the city."

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The following news stories are from the Yemeni independent website Al-Masdar ( http://www.almasdaronline.com/category/42  ):

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10 soldiers of the government forces were killed in Al-Jawf by a coalition air raid

August 20, 2018, ALMASDARONLINE ١٩ أغسطس ٢٠١٨

Ten government troops were killed by an air raid by coalition fighters on a site in the northeastern province of al-Jawf on Sunday morning.

A coalition fighter jet launched a raid on the army and Popular Resistance at “Aljullah”  in Bart Al Anan Directorate, adjacent to Sa'ada Governorate, killing 10 members of the brigade, including five officers with varying grades, Almasdar online correspondent said.

According to the source, the raid occurred during daylight hours and the shelling site was located just over four kilometers from the nearest site of the al-Houthi fighters.

Several directorates of the al- Jawf governorate are fighting fierce battles between government forces and the al-Houthi militia, especially the directorates adjacent to the governorate of Sa'ada, the stronghold of al-Houthi.

Soldiers holding dozens of trucks near the point of the "Shabwah elite" in Ataq

August 20, 2018, ALMASDARONLINE ٢٠ أغسطس ٢٠١٨

Soldiers belonging to the government forces ' al-Ataq axis on Monday detained dozens of transport trucks on the public road linking the city of Ataq, the center of Shabwa County (southeast), and the city of Aden, the temporary capital of southern.

Eyewitnesses told the Almasdar online that more than 100 trucks and trailers were stopped at the eastern entrance to the town of Ataq after they were prevented from being held by uniformed personnel at an armed roadblock they erected on Monday.

He added that the roadblock was erected by soldiers near a security post of the pro-Emirates elite forces, which is located between the checkpoint and the point about one kilometer away.

The truckers and their owners appealed to the local authority in Shabwah, and the security services to intervene to allow them to pass, being held from yesterday evening, wanting to reach their parents and families to share the joy of Eid, which falls on Tuesday.

Individuals claiming to be from the command of the military Ataq axis w, Shabwa elite forces condoned them, despite being waging a campaign to prevent the carrying of weapons in Ataq a week ago. 

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The following news stories are from the pro-Houthi website Yemen Extra (http://www.yemenextra.net/):

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Yemeni combat drone strikes US backed -Saudi-led coalition gatherings in the West Coast: Report

Aug 19, 2018, YemenExtra, Y.A

By: Yousra Abdulmalik

Yemeni army forces have struck a US backed -Saudi-led coalition gatherings in the West Coast front following a retaliatory offensive.

Yemen’s official YemenExtra , citing an unnamed military official, reported on Saturday that a Yemeni unmanned combat aerial vehicle (UCAV), type Qasef-1 (Striker-1), struck the coalition gatherings in the west coast.

On Aug.4, it  hit a Saudi military base in the kingdom’s southwestern region of Asir with a combat drone, managing to capture dozens of paid fighters in the western coasts of Yemen following a retaliatory offensive.

The possible death toll and the extent of the damage inflicted upon Saudi troops and the military base in the retaliatory attack have not been released yet.

The Air Force also targeted, earlier on the 7th of this month, the headquarters of Ambra camp in the West Coast, after an accurate monitoring operation.

Notably, 140 paid fighters were killed and more than 236 others were injured, in the West Coast, during the last 48 hours in the failed offensive operations of the forces of the coalition on Al-Duraihemi district in Hodeidah.

While the Yemeni army forces , backed by Tihama People, destroyed more than 15 machinery, including the US armored vehicle, Ashkosh, a military truck and a military vehicle. The source pointed out that among the paid fighters who were killed today, 40 paid fighters , were killed by an airstrike of the coalition while they tried to flee collectively from the battlefield.

The Amir of the so-called al-Qaeda, Ghalib Zaidi, was killed in Marib Saturday , while dozens of the coalition paid fighters in addition to Al Qaeda ranks that were killed and injured during encountering a military ground creep.

The Ministry of Defense confirmed the escape of paid fighters and al Qaeda, leaving the bodies of the killed paid fighters in Melh valley in Sarawah, including the body of Ghaleb Zaidi. Ghaleb Zaidi is one of the commanders of “Al Qaeda” in Yemen and involved in dozens of criminal operations.

A few days ago the Associated Press published a report that revealed the alliance of the coalition making deals with the so-called al-Qaeda in fighting against the Yemeni army forces.

Seperately , more than a dozen Yemeni fishermen have lost their lives and several others sustained injuries when Saudi fighter jets targeted their fishing boats off the coast of the western province of Hodeidah .

In addition, another four Yemeni fishermen remained unaccounted four.

In March 2015, the US backed –Saudi-led coalition started  a war against Yemen with the declared aim of crushing the Houthi Ansarullah movement, who had taken over from the staunch Riyadh ally and fugitive former president Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, while also seeking to secure the Saudi border with its southern neighbor. Three years and over 600,000 dead and injured Yemeni people and  prevented the patients from travelling abroad for treatment and blocked the entry of medicine into the war-torn country, the war has yielded little to that effect.

Despite the coalition claims that it is bombing the positions of the Ansarullah fighters, Saudi bombers are flattening residential areas and civilian infrastructures.

A UN panel has compiled a detailed report of civilian casualties caused by the Saudi military and its allies during their war against Yemen, saying the Riyadh-led coalition has used precision-guided munitions in its raids on civilian targets.

Sayyad Abdulmalik AL-Houthi claimed on one of his speech that Saudi Arabia is just a tool used by USA and Israel to fight Yemen to conquer it and wrestle control over Red Sea and Bab-AL-Mandab which will enable them to rule the world.

According to several reports, the coalition air campaign against Yemen has driven the impoverished country towards humanitarian disaster, as the coalitiondeadly campaign prevented the patients from travelling abroad for treatment and blocked the entry of medicine into the war-torn country.

Heavy losses amid the coalition in its airstrikes in the West Coast

Aug 20, 2018, YemenExtra, Y.A

The US backed -Saudi-led coalition has sustained big losses in lives and ammunitions in coalition airstrikes in the West Coast Front and al-Jawf front, in addition to the suffering inside the secret prisons.

According to YemenExtra site big losses happened when the coalition warplanes targeted its paid fighters in the West Cost on Aug.18.

The paid fighters were hit by the strike in less than a week after a similar strike in the same area on the West Coast.

Today,it launched  three airstrikes, targeting coalition’s paid fighters and vehicles in Jawf province ,killing ten paid fighters, including five field commanders, injured 15 others and burned three military vehicles in Khab washaaf district.

Military forces of the Military Intelligence Unit, which is headed by Emirati officers and another of the Southern Giants Brigades, carried out a large-scale arrest campaign this week of officers and soldiers of Brigadier General Tariq Saleh in the West Coast Front. A southern source in a telephone conversation with the editor of “YemenExtra”, the military intelligence of the coalition, the arrest of the monitoring and surveillance officer in the forces of “guards of the Republic” and a number of soldiers on charges of treason and work for the “Houthis, Ansarallh ,part of the Yemeni army forces.

He confirmed to the source that the military intelligence accused the official of the monitoring and reconnaissance in the 3rd Battalion of the “Guardians of the Republic” and a number of its soldiers of sending wrong coordinates, which was caused by the war coalition aircraft to military gatherings of soldiers and brigades following the fourth brigade Giants of the south, west of the Direhmi Directorate, which caused the falling of 13 dead a number of wounded, including the leader, “Hassan Yafi“.

Notably, at least 140 of the coalition paid fighters were killed and 236 injured when the Yemeni army forces repelled their attacks in Duraihimi district of Western coast front during the past 48 hours.

The army also destroyed more than 15 military vehicles in the same front, killing and injuring all their crews.The paid fighters tried to launch offensives and to infiltrate, backing with air cover, from three sites, but the army repelled them and inflicted the paid fighters heavy losses in lives and equipment.

According to a military official, there is a military prison belonging to the UAE in the Directorate of the coastal Mukha allocated by the UAE to arrest its loyalists from the coast front .

On June 20, the Associated Press reported that Emirati officers had been torturing and sexually assaulting hundreds of captives at UAE-run prisons in southern Yemen. According to the report, the UAE runs a network of at least 18 secret prisons.

A month later, Amnesty International also reported that the UAE and its allied local militia had been torturing captives at a network of clandestine prisons in southern Yemen.

According to the new report obtained by Al Jazeera, the number of UAE-run secret prisons is 27, including sites in Hadramout, Aden, Socotra, Mayyun Island, as well as a facility in Eritrea where the UAE maintains a military base.

The forces subjected the inmates to rape and electrocution in the genitals, chest and armpits, it said, adding some prisoners were physically assaulted and insulted while being hung in midair.

The sources also recounted other examples of horrors in the UAE-controlled prisons, saying electric cables were used alongside wooden bats and steel poles during interrogation sessions.

Some of the detainees were subjected to sleep deprivation while being confined to narrow spaces with poor hygienic conditions and limited air ventilation, according to the report.

This form of torture was accompanied for some of the inmates by sessions where their skins were lashed with whips and their injuries were subsequently covered in salt. Others, it said, had industrial nails inserted into their fingers and toenails.

According to the report, more than 49 people were tortured to death and five gravesites were used to bury the deceased.

The US-Saudi-led coalition  launched an offensive on Hudaydah on 12 June in the largest battle of the war that the United Nations fears risks triggering a famine in Yemen where an estimated 8.4 million people are on the verge of starvation. Recently, It has been paused for peace talks, but no deal has been struck leaving Yemenis pessimistic over a viable political process.

Abdulmalik al-Houthi, the leader of the Houthi(Ansarallah)  movement, which is the main force that faces the coallition, said on a TV speech ,” The decision of invading the Yemeni ,western coast, has been taken and adopted by the United States of America,noting that the Saudis are trying to abolish Yemen’s freedom,” stressing that it was the people of Yemen’s right to defend their country.

The Bab el-Mandab Strait, which is the southern entrance to the Red Sea, is one of the world’s key shipping lanes for crude oil and allows crude exports into the European market.

The United Nations said more than 350,000 people have been displaced from the strategic Red Sea port town of Hudaydah in western Yemen since June.Deputy spokesman for the Secretary-General, Farhan Haq, said during a press conference on Monday that violent clashes have erupted in the city over the past few days, especially in the Ad Durayhimi district.He added that emergency humanitarian assistance has already been provided to more than 90 per cent of those displaced.

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