SANAA/NEW YORK: Ahmadiya Juaidi’s eyes are wide as she drinks a nutrition shake from a large orange mug, her thin fingers grasping the handle. Her hair is pulled back and around her neck hangs a silver necklace with a heart and the letter A.
Three weeks ago the 13-year-old weighed just nine kilograms (20 pounds) when she was admitted to Al-Sabeen hospital in Yemen’s capital Sanaa with malnutrition that sickened her for at least the past four years. Now she weighs 15 kilograms.
“I am afraid when we go back to the countryside her condition will deteriorate again due to lack of nutritional food. We have no income,” her older brother, Muhammad Abdo Taher Shami, told Reuters.
They are among some 16 million Yemenis — more than half the population of the Arabian Peninsula country — that the United Nations says are going hungry. Of those, five million are on the brink of famine, UN aid chief Mark Lowcock warns.
On Monday the United Nations hopes to raise some $3.85 billion at a virtual pledging event to avert what Lowcock says would be a large-scale “man-made” famine, the worst the world will have seen for decades.
Some 80 percent of Yemenis need help, with 400,000 children under the age of five severely malnourished, according to UN data. For much of its food, the country relies on imports that have been badly disrupted over the years by all warring parties.
“Before the war Yemen was a poor country with a malnutrition problem, but it was one which had a functioning economy, a government that provided services to quite a lot of its people, a national infrastructure and an export base,” Lowcock told reporters. “The war has largely destroyed all of that.”
“In the modern world famines are basically about people having no income and then other people blocking efforts to help them. That’s basically what we’ve got in Yemen,” he added.
Yemen’s children starve as UN seeks billions to avoid vast ‘man-made’ famine
Yemen’s children starve as UN seeks billions to avoid vast ‘man-made’ famine
- Some 80 percent of Yemenis need help, with 400,000 children under the age of five severely malnourished
Some 4,397 Israeli settlers stormed Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque in January, says Palestinian Authority
- Settlers sometimes accompanied by Israeli government officials, including National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir
- Jerusalem Governorate recorded 86 demolitions, leveling of homes, structures belonging to Palestinians in January
LONDON: The Palestinian Authority has reported that 4,397 settlers stormed the Al-Aqsa Mosque in East Jerusalem in January.
The Jerusalem Governorate said that the figure indicated a significant escalation by Israeli settlers in their attempts to establish a new status quo while undermining the historic and legal status of the sacred site.
Settlers were sometimes accompanied by Israeli government officials, including the far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir. In addition, 7,868 other individuals were permitted by Israeli authorities to enter the site in the “tourism” category, according to the WAFA News Agency.
The governorate reported that settlers had distributed Jewish prayer leaflets during tours, performed dances, and conducted the “epic prostration” ritual.
Israel’s Knesset has also sought to limit Muslim worshippers’ access to Al-Aqsa Mosque during Ramadan.
The governorate said: “These actions constitute a direct violation of the historical and legal status quo and represent an overt attempt to impose Israeli sovereignty over Al-Aqsa Mosque.”
The governorate also recorded in January 86 demolitions and leveling of homes and structures in Jerusalem belonging to Palestinians. The number includes five forced demolitions and 79 carried out by Israeli machinery, in addition to two land-leveling operations targeting agricultural lands.
