What Is Really Going on in Yemen?

Rasa - Washington and Riyadh claim that the Saudi-led and US-backed war on Yemen is all about containing Iran and its Shiite proxy forces. But is that really the case?

News ID: 438057

Date: 03 June 2018 - 22:54

RNA - There are a group of people in the United States and Saudi Arabia plus media lackeys that want us to believe this line. They want us to look at their war crimes and indiscriminate airstrikes against civilian population in Yemen, and see how great and amazing this war really is, and how “it is serving a humane and common purpose”.

Things have gotten out of hand lately, so much so that the warmongers no longer shy away from publicly announcing that they are selling and using cluster bombs and other types of munitions and starvation methods against the poorest nation in the Middle East in broad daylight and in breach of International Law.

The US Congress has once again approved the sale of more bombs to Saudi Arabia. Corporate media claim the House narrowly defeated the measure that would have banned the transfer of these bombs, and that the closeness of the vote is an indication of growing congressional opposition to the conduct of the US-backed, Saudi-led bombing coalition in Yemen. This is fantasy.

The use of US-made bombs, including clusters, responsible for most of the civilian deaths in Yemen, including children, is condemnable under International Law. They are banned by an international treaty signed by 119 countries, not including the United States and Saudi Arabia. The US opposed the treaty, and instead of signing it, adopted a policy that cluster bombs should never be used in concentrated, civilian areas. That of course has always been in words, not in action.

As reported by many human rights groups and UN aid agencies, Saudi Arabia has been deliberately targeting civilians with cluster bombs since the war began in March 2015, and the US government is in the know. The Saudi-led coalition drops cluster bombs to specifically target known civilian neighbourhoods, even centers that are for the medics.

What's more, the Saudis use other types of US-produced weapons to destroy schools, markets, factories, and hospitals. So unlike what they say, the US Congress is not getting tired of selling Saudi Arabia bombs when it is dropping them on civilians and committing crimes against humanity. The American officials also don't mind any backlash from the international community for their complicity in Saudi crimes. There is always colonial operatives, powerful lobby groups, petrodollar cash, and Security Council veto power to keep any UN criticism or resolution at bay.

Perhaps that says why the UN refuses to publicly condemn the Saudi use of cluster bombs, let alone place a complete arms embargo on Riyadh and its partners. Simply put, this will never happen. The United States and its partners have the upper hand at the UN with final say in almost everything. As a consequence, the custom of dropping bombs to target civilians has taken away the sense of it, and the course of the UN has taken away the shame of it.

Now imagine just for a moment that this was Iran selling internationally banned weapons to Yemen to be used against Saudi Arabia and its US-backed coalition partners. The international backlash would have been immediate and devastating. There would have been overwhelming condemnations at the UN, followed by arms embargo, resolutions, economic sanctions, travel bans for Iranian officials, perhaps even air, land and sea blockade just to get the message across. But this is not Iran. This is Washington and Riyadh, and the international community doesn't want to do any thing about it.

According to Fars News Agancy, it has become impossible to ignore, but the current conflict in Yemen is not at all a proxy war between Iran and Saudi Arabia. It is flat out aggression that doesn’t comfort with International Law. It is dark, it has no good in it, and the world community should stop looking at it like Riyadh and Washington.

Now, you would think these sorts of realizations would make the United Nations go into a tail dive into depression. They won't. By removing Saudi Arabia and its partners from the blacklist of those killing children in Yemen, the world body has already shown its true colours. One doesn't need to dig deeper.

Here, the world community doesn't know how to trust everything the UN says anymore, or trust that the world body is some sort of partner for global peace and justice. Within this darkness, the UN is nowhere near it should be. It never bothers to intervene and use its leverage to stop the American-Saudi madness in Yemen, nor does it have any intention to take any measure to stop the war.

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