Hospitals have been destroyed, health workers killed
by Catherine Shakdam | Mint Press News [1] | July 30, 2015
Five months have passed since Saudi Arabia declared war on Yemen, and for all its might, political resolve and military arsenal, the kingdom has yet to bring the poorest nation on the Arabian Peninsula to heel.
Its institutions in tatters, its military apparatus reduced to rubbles, and with no economy to speak of, Yemen’s imminent collapse [2] has been foretold time and time again by experts and state officials. Yet these predictions have not quite come to fruition.
In its match against Goliath, David is resisting. In rallies [3], demonstrations [4] and even an open letter [5] signed by 18 Yemen scholars and experts living in the United States and Britain, tens of thousands of Yemenis [6] and others around the world [7] have decried Riyadh’s actions, calling for an end to all violence.
Yet this dedication to opposing Riyadh’s actions doesn’t mean Yemenis aren’t suffering. The World Health Organization issued a statement in June, warning that a “major health crisis is unfolding in Yemen, where hospitals have been destroyed, health workers killed and critical shortages of food, medical supplies and fuel are causing large-scale suffering.”
In early July, the United Nations declared [8] the situation in Yemen to be the highest level of humanitarian emergency. According to a U.N. report [9] published July 7, over 1,500 civilians have been killed, 3,600 have been injured, and over a million have been displaced in the ongoing conflict.
Read more [1]