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Hundreds killed as Saudi coalition closes in on rebel enclave
CBS News ^ | 06/11/18

Posted on 06/11/2018 11:57:17 AM PDT by Simon Green

Heavy fighting in Yemen between pro-government forces and Shiite rebels has killed more than 600 people on both sides in recent days, security officials said Monday. A charity said meanwhile that an airstrike by the Saudi-led coalition had destroyed a new cholera clinic in the country's north.

Government forces, backed by the Saudi-led coalition, have been advancing along the western coast in recent weeks as they battle the Iran-allied rebels, known as Houthis.

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief the media. Witnesses, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals, said the fighting has forced dozens of families to leave their homes.

The United States urged all parties of the conflict to ensure humanitarian access to the Yemeni people, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Monday. The U.S, he said, is closely following developments in Hodeidah and urged Emirati leaders to preserve "the free flow of humanitarian aid and life-saving commercial imports."

The United Nations warned Friday that a military attack or siege on Hodeida would affect hundreds of thousands of civilians. Some 600,000 people live in and around the city.

International aid group Doctors Without Borders said Monday the Saudi-led coalition has attacked a cholera treatment center in the northern province of Hajja.

The group, known by its French acronym MSF, has temporarily frozen its activities in the area, "until we guarantee the safety of our staff and patients," said João Martins, MSF's head of mission in Yemen tweeted.

Yemen has been embroiled in a civil war pitting the coalition against the Iran-backed Houthis since March 2015. The coalition aims to restore the government of self-exiled President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi.

The three-year stalemated war has killed more than 10,000 people and displaced more than 3 million. It has damaged Yemen's infrastructure, crippled its health system and pushed the Arab world's poorest country to the brink of famine.

The U.N. considers Yemen to be the world's worst humanitarian crisis, with more than 22.2 million people in need of assistance. Malnutrition, cholera and other diseases have killed or sickened thousands of civilians over the years.


TOPICS: Egypt; Foreign Affairs; Israel; News/Current Events; Russia; Syria; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: abedrabbomansourhadi; djibouti; egypt; erdogan; eritrea; gaza; hamas; hassannasrallah; hezbollah; houthi; iran; isis; israel; jerusalem; jordan; kurdistan; lebanon; letshavejerusalem; mikepompeo; receptayyiperdogan; russia; saudiarabia; sinai; sudan; syria; turkey; unitedarabemirates; waronterror; yemen
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1 posted on 06/11/2018 11:57:18 AM PDT by Simon Green
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To: Simon Green

I’m assuming there’s a downside to this.


2 posted on 06/11/2018 12:11:35 PM PDT by Valin
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To: Simon Green

Lots of American mercs...just say’in


3 posted on 06/11/2018 12:17:38 PM PDT by rrrod (just an old guy with a gun in his pocket)
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To: Simon Green
Ok, sounds good. Here's the steps to the plan:
  1. Exterminate the rebels to a man.
     
  2. Exterminate the "coalition" to a man
Done!
4 posted on 06/11/2018 12:22:28 PM PDT by Governor Dinwiddie (MAGA in the mornin', MAGA in the evenin', MAGA at suppertime . . .)
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To: Simon Green

See how happy and carefree muslim ruled countries are?


5 posted on 06/11/2018 12:33:42 PM PDT by Bullish (government=overfunded stupidity.)
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To: Simon Green

The Saudis better get used to trench warfare against a committed enemy.

They will one day have to fight for their lives against Iran.

Yemen is child’s play in comparison.


6 posted on 06/11/2018 12:38:59 PM PDT by Mariner (War Criminal #18)
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To: Simon Green

Hodeida is the main port through which Iran (or anyone else) can supply their local allies/surrogates, who have been trying to take over Yemen.

Hodeida, and the Capital city of Sana’a, are the main strategic targets remaining to effectively defeat Iran’s ambition of controlling Yemen.

When Hodeida falls (as seems likely), it will accelerate what is already a rapid pushback of the Iranian-backed Houthis, who conducted a coup and nearly captured all the main ports and cities in the country in 2014. It will likely be the decisive engagement of the war, as it is the main port for the capital, and the main source of armament and revenue for the Iranian-backed Houthis.

UAE-backed forces have cleared up the coast from the South, securing the naval choke point (Bab el Mandab) at the Southern end of the Red Sea, where 12% of the world’s shipping passes, and more of it’s oil. They are now moving to encircle the port city of Hodeida, and are within artillery range, with a supporting Naval task force offshore.

Since the Houthis took this important port and the Capital City in 2014 (not long after Obama provided money to the Iranian regime), this war has inflicted exceptional deprivation on the civilian population, compounded by disease outbreaks.

The collapse of Iranian surrogates in the wider region has been a significant development, since President Trump withdrew from the Iran deal, and the Treasury Department raided the bank accounts that Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps used to fund its surrogates.

Our Regional allies, Israel, Saudi Arabia and the UAE had military offensives prepared to strike (apparently coordinated), in both Syria and Yemen, which have pretty dramatically altered the military situation in both countries. The elections in Iraq during this time, has also resulted in an ongoing effort to block out Iranian-backed groups from the next Iraqi Government.


7 posted on 06/11/2018 1:12:07 PM PDT by BeauBo
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To: Simon Green

The Houthis are like the Rohingya in Burma. Iran-funded and equipped, they started the trouble. Now it’s a humanitarian problem that they are getting theirs.


8 posted on 06/11/2018 1:15:40 PM PDT by lurk
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To: Simon Green

I wonder how many Iranian special ops were killed. They are 100% behind this violent “uprising.”


9 posted on 06/11/2018 2:23:38 PM PDT by montag813
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To: Simon Green

You put boots on the ground in Yemen, your gonna step in lots of shiite.


10 posted on 06/11/2018 2:27:14 PM PDT by Delta 21 (Build The Wall !! Jail The Cankle !!)
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To: rrrod
Lots of American mercs...just say’in

Play stupid games....

11 posted on 06/11/2018 2:30:38 PM PDT by dfwgator (Endut! Hoch Hech!)
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To: Simon Green

Meddlers Without Borders have no standing in the prosecution of a war. If they get in the way, they become enemy and can be captured or killed.

What they want is irrelevant


12 posted on 06/11/2018 2:34:46 PM PDT by bert ((K.E. N.P. N.C. +12 ..... Greetings Jacques. The revolution is coming))
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To: dfwgator

Saudis were recruiting mercs in Colombia earlier this year. Bonus sign ups..big bucks..lots of promises. I told a friend’s son to back away fast.


13 posted on 06/11/2018 2:39:39 PM PDT by rrrod (just an old guy with a gun in his pocket)
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To: Mariner
"Yemen is child’s play in comparison."

Like Libya, Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria it's a testing ground and training exercise.

14 posted on 06/11/2018 3:52:41 PM PDT by fella ("As it was before Noah so shall it be again,")
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To: BeauBo; AdmSmith; AnonymousConservative; Berosus; Bockscar; cardinal4; ColdOne; ...

thanks BeauBo et al.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/3662339/posts?page=7#7


15 posted on 06/12/2018 12:15:39 AM PDT by SunkenCiv (www.tapatalk.com/groups/godsgravesglyphs/, forum.darwincentral.org, www.gopbriefingroom.com)
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To: dennisw; Cachelot; Nix 2; veronica; Catspaw; knighthawk; Alouette; Optimist; weikel; Lent; GregB; ..
Middle East and terrorism, occasional political and Jewish issues Ping List. High Volume If you’d like to be on or off, please FR mail me.

..................

16 posted on 06/12/2018 5:03:25 AM PDT by SJackson (The easiest way to find something lost around the house is to buy a replacement)
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To: Simon Green

The Yeminia/Saudi war is never covered. People know as much about Yemen as Gary Johnson knows about Aleppo. Hundreds killed. No biggie. Ten thousand killed? Who cares. But if Israeli’s nail an arab trying to break down the border wall it’s headline news throughout the world and the UN calls for a world emergency.


17 posted on 06/12/2018 6:27:13 AM PDT by Karliner (Jeremiah29:11,Romans8:28 Isa 17, Damascus has fallen)
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To: BeauBo

Thanks for your post. Could I go so far as to say this is a Sunni/shia proxy war( Saudi’s vs Iran) or is there more to this?


18 posted on 06/12/2018 6:31:36 AM PDT by Karliner (Jeremiah29:11,Romans8:28 Isa 17, Damascus has fallen)
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To: Karliner

“Could I go so far as to say this is a Sunni/Shia proxy war( Saudi’s vs Iran)”

Sunni/Shia is a big part of it, but both Iran and the previous Saudi jihadi surrogates (like ISIS) have wider aspirations, even though they hate each other the most. In Yemen, it is more directly Iran vs. Saudi Arabia/UAE (political). In Syria or Iran it is relatively more Sunni vs Shia (sectarian) - but in every case Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) has a commanding role on the Shia side..

Across the region, the Iranian/Shi’ite side is much more centrally commanded by the Iranian regime. On the Sunni side, many of the jihadi groups have gone off on their own, and are only loosely influenced by the Saudi Government. Many of them were self-generated based in the Wahabbi doctrine, but never under direct Saudi control.

In Yemen though, the Sunni side are directly operated by the Saudi and UAE Governments, as regular military forces (albeit with many foreign mercenary troops).

In Yemen, the Houthis are a variety of Shi’ite that is pretty far from the Iranians - almost Sunni. They are really more a political/military proxy of the Iranian Government, than a religious/ideological one. To a large degree, the Houthis had a long term political grievance within Yemen, and just took Iranian support, because they were the only ones who would support them.

The Houthi/Iranian side also employs a bunch of foreign mercenaries (albeit lower skilled black African mercs, versus the relatively high-end mercs the UAE and Saudis hire, like Columbians and Morrocans in the rank and file, with Western and South African advisers).


19 posted on 06/12/2018 12:47:33 PM PDT by BeauBo
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To: bert

“Meddlers Without Borders”

Touché.


20 posted on 06/12/2018 12:49:23 PM PDT by BeauBo
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