Daily Times

Listen to the rhetoric of the global leaders, the intellectuals, world’s top opinion-makers, the right activists and the masses in general, on humanity and human rights; you get the impression as if we embody the pain of the entire humankind; we support all oppressed and condemn all oppressors irrespective of colour, creed, religion or ethnicity.

The above all, in today’s cruel world dictated by the Machiavellian Politics, falls into the realm of idealism, hence rejected. Our pragmatism and inherent prejudices force us to extend support to only those oppressed who share with us the bond of caste, creed, colour, religion, ethnicity, or political beliefs.

We support oppressed at one place while standing with the oppressor at the other. Certain acts are defined as oppression in one country while being legitimate elsewhere. We have divided the oppressed on religious, sectarian, ethnic and political lines. It takes a lot of moral courage to rise above the religious, sectarian or political biases and support all oppressed irrespective of colour, creed, religion or ethnicity. Do we have that moral courage?

Those who lament day in and day out over human sufferings in Syria keep mum over the miseries of the Yemenis, the most impoverished Arab nation for the last three years, blockaded and pounded with indiscriminate air bombardment by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) and its Arab and the Western allies, the champion of the democracy and human rights, the USA included.

Those who blame Russia and Iran for their intervention in Syrian affairs, in the same breath, support the meddling of the KSA and its allies in Yemenis affairs and vice versa. If the Iranian and Russian involvement in Syria is wrong, how are killings of innocent civilians by the KSA and its allies justified in Yemen?

The KSA and its allies must not use land, water and aerial blockade and the bombardment of Yemen as battle tactics to punish innocent civilians

According to ‘Save The Children’ estimates, at least 50,000 children died in 2017.“An estimated 130 children in Yemen die every day from extreme hunger and disease. A continuing blockade on the country’s northern ports of entry is likely to increase the death toll further…”

The world in general and the western media, the right activists, the champions of democracy and the free world have sufficient time to defend animal rights but when it comes to the sufferings of poor Yemenis, especially the children dying of hunger, disease and indiscriminate use of force against the civilians, they behave like a deaf and blind.

Do we have the courage to ask the KSA and its allies to lift the blockade of Yemen and allow humanitarian aid reach civilians starving of acute food shortage, medicine and other lifesaving drugs?

Do we have the courage to ask the allies earning billions by exporting arms to the KSA to stop doing this, since the same weapons are used to kill innocent civilians?

If the terrorists of Eastern Ghouta in Syria could have the blessings of the West and the US as they demand to lift the siege of the terrorist-held area on a humanitarian basis, why should the similar demand not be made for the innocent Yemeni civilians?

But we see, the world is silent. Isn’t this hypocrisy and double standards?

The Yemen war is often painted as a sectarian conflict. In reality, the Houthis demands have been primarily economic and political in nature. The Yemeni public, including the Houthis, was angered with the government’s decision to lift fuel subsidies in July 2014 and took to the streets demanding the government to step down. The Houthis proceeded to take over Sanaa in September, forcing the government to flee.

The Houthis were assisted in their advance by former Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh and his supporters. Saleh, overthrown by protests in 2011, was killed by the Houthis in 2017 as he tried to defect and flee to KSA.

The Western and the Arab world claim to fight Bashar-al-Assad for Syrian people’s economic and political rights, but they deny any such right to the Yemenis. If the ‘Syrian people’ have the right to rebel against an internationally recognised government, why don’t the Yemenis have such right to stand for economic and political rights?

The KSA, the US and their allies face a policy paradox as they support militants and intend to overthrow a legitimate government in Syria but in Yemen, the same countries support a puppet regime defeated by the people and kill innocent civilians in the name of fighting terrorism. The rebellion against Assad in Syria is freedom fight, but the Houthis revolt in Yemen is terrorism!

Thousands have been killed, millions internally displaced facing food insecurity and diseases like Cholera in Yemen. The UN has warned that if the Saudi-led coalition didn’t end the siege and allow humanitarian assistance to reach to the people in Yemen, the country could face worst humanitarian crisis faced by humanity in last 50 years.

The KSA and its allies must not use land, water and aerial blockade and the bombardment of Yemen as battle tactics to punish innocent civilians, since doing so is against the international law, human dignity and morality. All belligerents involved in the conflict need to take care of collateral damage of the Yamen civil war.

The foreign intervention from Yemen should end, and the Yemenis themselves should be allowed to exercise their inalienable right of self-determination.

The writer is a journalist & analyst based in Islamabad. He tweets at @kashifaliraza & can be reached at meetkashi514@gmail.com

Published in Daily Times, April 3^rd 2018.