JEDDAH: The youth minister of Yemen’s Houthi rebels has proposed using child soldiers in the country’s ongoing civil war.
On Friday, Hassan Zaid, minister for youth and sport in an administration set up by the Iran-backed rebels and not internationally recognized, suggested suspending school for a year and sending pupils and teachers to the front.
“Wouldn't we be able to reinforce the ranks with hundreds of thousands (of fighters) and win the battle?” Zaid wrote on Facebook.
The Yemeni government described Zaid’s proposal as a “fascist procedure.”
“This is further proof that this militia is a war-mongering group that pays no regard to the values of the Yemeni people,” Rajeh Badi, Yemeni government spokesman, told Arab News on Friday. “While students should be encouraged to consistently engage in the education process, this top Houthi official calls for suspending school and sending them to the war zone.”
Badi stressed that the Houthis pose a threat not only to the stability and security of Yemen and the Yemeni people, but also to that of the region and the world at large.
“The world, and human rights organizations that have been turning a deaf ear and a blind eye to ongoing Houthi violations of Yemeni civil rights, must realize the savage nature of this fascist militia who has been using Yemeni children to fight for them,” he said.
Yemen has been devastated by a war between the Houthis, who control the capital, Sanaa, and the internationally recognized government of President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi.
A teachers' strike in rebel territory, in protest at salaries going unpaid for around a year, delayed the start of the school year by two weeks. When schools did open, on Sunday, classrooms were largely empty.
Social media users responded angrily to the minister's post.
“What if we let the students study and send the ministers and their bodyguards to the front?” one wrote. “That would give us victory and a prosperous future.”
Zaid seemed bemused by those who complained about his proposal.
“People close the schools under the pretext of a strike and when we think about how to take advantage of this situation, they take offense,” he said.
UNICEF estimates 13,146 schools, or 78 percent of all of Yemen's schools, have been hit by the salary crunch, while nearly 500 schools have been destroyed by the conflict, commandeered by armed factions, or repurposed as shelters.
Houthi minister’s war strategy: Send schoolchildren to battlefield
Houthi minister’s war strategy: Send schoolchildren to battlefield
Son of jailed Palestinian politician Marwan Barghouti demands UK do more to secure his release
- Arab Barghouti warns failure to free his father despite UK backing Palestinian statehood would give ‘false hope’
- Marwan Barghouti has been imprisoned by Israel for 22 years but regularly tops polls for next Palestinian president
LONDON: The son of renowned Palestinian politician Marwan Barghouti has demanded that the UK government make his release from Israeli prison a central part of its efforts to support a Palestinian state.
Arab Barghouti said his father’s freedom is essential to continue the political process after the UK announced that it would recognize a Palestinian state last year.
“Simply saying ‘we support a two-state solution’ without doing anything about it is deepening the problem, because you are just giving the Palestinian people false hopes,” Arab Barghouti said.
His intervention comes amid a campaign by British MPs from across the political spectrum to secure Marwan Barghouti’s release.
He has been in prison for 22 years after being convicted of five murders, but the UK’s Inter-Parliamentary Union found in an inquiry in 2003 that his trial failed to meet several fairness criteria.
Simon Henderson, the author of the IPU inquiry, told a meeting in Westminster that of the 96 witnesses in the trial, only 21 could testify over Marwan Barghouti’s involvement in the deaths of the four Israelis and one Greek, but that none confirmed it and 12 specifically exonerated him of blame.
A Fatah member who is referred to as the Palestinian Nelson Mandela, he regularly tops polls of who the Palestinian people believe would make a good successor to current President Mahmoud Abbas.
Arab Barghouti said: “The UK recognition of Palestine is going to be seen as symbolic in the history books as long as there are no actual steps being taken on the ground.”
He added: “Current Palestinian politics is dysfunctional and that can only be changed with democratic renewal, including a new leadership that really represents the people. We have not had elections for 20 years.
“My father does not have a magic stick, he cannot change everything overnight, but people look at my father as a source of hope.”
Over the past 15 years, Israel has released more than 500 Palestinian prisoners serving life sentences, but Barghouti has always been excluded from such deals.
His son said: “The reason he is not being released is because the Israeli government does not want a legitimate Palestinian leader, because it does not want a two-state solution.”
Adding that his father has been held in solitary confinement since Oct. 7, 2023, and is regularly assaulted by guards, he added: “If that is not an invitation to speak out against the violations of international law, I don’t know what is.
“I would expect the UK government, as an upholder of international law, to go further and call for his release.
“He can change the status quo, Palestinian politics, and take us on a path to where there is real hope for a political settlement.
“We have not yet had brave enough British politicians when it comes to the highest level of politics.”
The Foreign Office has not supported calls for Marwan Barghouti’s release, but said it affirms the right of Palestinians in Israeli prisons to have access to the International Committee of the Red Cross.
