Fresh Saudi Airstrikes Leave Dozen More Civilians Dead in SW Yemen

At least a dozen people have lost their lives in a fresh Saudi airstrike against a civilian target in Yemen’s southwestern province of Ta’izz as the Riyadh regime presses ahead with its devastating aerial campaign against its crisis-stricken southern neighbor,  Press T.V reported.

Local sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Arabic-language al-Masirah television network that the Saudi military aircraft on Thursday struck a bridge linking the al-Barh area of Maqbanah district to Hees town, killing four people.

Eight more lost their lives when Saudi jets targeted a civilian car in another part of the province, situated 260 kilometers south of the capital Sana’a.

 Earlier in the day, Saudi warplanes bombarded residential neighborhoods in the Ghamar district of Yemen’s mountainous northwestern province of Sa’ada, killing eight people. Two women, a child and three paramedics were among those killed.

Three civilians were also killed when Saudi fighter jets carried out three aerial attacks against al-Ghad area in the Razih district of the same Yemeni province.

Separately, Saudi warplanes conducted four aerial assaults against the Sawar al-Afsal area of Razih district, though no reports of casualties were immediately available.

Saudi Arabia has been incessantly pounding Yemen since March 2015 in an attempt to crush the popular Houthi Ansarullah movement and reinstate the former Yemeni president, AbdRabbuh Mansur Hadi, a staunch ally of the Riyadh regime.

More than 12,000 people have been killed since the onset of the campaign more than two and a half years ago. Much of the Arabian Peninsula country’s infrastructure, including hospitals, schools and factories, has been reduced to rubble due to the war.

The Saudi-led war has also triggered a deadly cholera epidemic across Yemen.

According to the World Health Organization’s latest count, the cholera outbreak has killed 2,167 people since the end of April and is suspected to have infected 841,906.

On November 26, the United Nations children’s agency (UNICEF) said that more than 11 million children in Yemen were in acute need of aid, stressing that it was estimated that every 10 minutes a child died of a preventable disease there.

Additionally, the UN has described the current level of hunger in Yemen as “unprecedented,” emphasizing that 17 million people are now food insecure in the country.

It added that 6.8 million, meaning almost one in four people, do not have enough food and rely entirely on external assistance.

A recent survey showed that almost one third of families had gaps in their diets, and hardly ever consumed foods like pulses, vegetables, fruit, dairy products or meat.

More than 3 million pregnant and nursing women and children under 5 also need support to prevent or cure malnutrition.

Diphtheria spreading in Yemen amid Saudi war, says aid groups

Meanwhile, aid officials have warned of the spread of diphtheria in war-torn Yemen, which has already been grappling with a deadly cholera outbreak amid a devastating Saudi war.

The World Health Organization (WHO) said Wednesday that more than 280 suspected diphtheria cases and 33 associated deaths were reported in Yemen as of Tuesday, many of them children who had not been immunized against the disease.

“Left unchecked, diphtheria can cause devastating epidemics, mainly affecting children,” TarikJasarevic, a WHO spokesman, told Reuters.

WHO and officials with the international medical charity Doctors Without Border, also known by its French acronym MSF, said the diphtheria spread is inevitable in Yemen due to low vaccination rates, lack of access to medical care and so many people moving around and coming in contact with those infected.

According to health officials, diphtheria spreads as easily as the common cold through sneezing, coughing or even talking.

“There is the potential for a larger-scale outbreak of diphtheria, given that not everyone has been vaccinated,” MSF’s emergency coordinator in Yemen, Marc Poncin said.

Yemen is already battling a cholera epidemic that has infected about one million people. Earlier in October, WHO said that the epidemic, exacerbated by the devastation of the country’s health infrastructure, has killed more than 2,000?

“This is undeniably another human-made disease inflicted on a country that has barely recovered from a massive cholera outbreak, which is not even over yet,” Poncin said.

According to MSF, diphtheria could be more fatal than cholera, especially among unvaccinated children under 5 years old, saying as many as two in five diphtheria cases end in death.

Caroline Boustany, an aid worker with the International Rescue Committee, called the outbreak as “very worrisome,” saying, “We have a spike in cases of a very easily preventable disease.”

Diphtheria is a contagious and potentially fatal bacterial infection, mainly characterized by a thick grey membrane at the back of the throat or nose, sore throat and fever. It can be prevented through vaccination.

The United Nations warned on Monday that 8.4 million people in war-torn Yemen are “a step away from famine,” as the country faces soaring food prices and fuel shortages duo to a Saudi blockade on the impoverished country.

Saudi Arabia and a group of its allies have been bombing Yemen since 2015 to put its former Riyadh-friendly government back in the saddle. More than 12,000 have died since the war began.

Now, more than eight million Yemenis are on the verge of starvation, making the country the scene of, what the UN calls, the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.

Meanwhile, the head of the US government’s aid agency said on Tuesday that there were no signs that a Saudi blockade of the ports had eased to let in aid consignments.

United Nations chief Antonio Guterres called last Sunday for an end to the “stupid war,” which has also the firm backing of the United States and Britain.

R.S