Yemen: The Stupidest War

"They hit everything, hospitals, orphanages, schools," Hisham al-Omeisy told The Guardian newspaper six months ago. "You live in constant fear that your kids' school could be the next target."

No, he's not talking about the wicked Russians bombing the eastern side of Aleppo in Syria, which is stirring up so much synthetic indignation in Washington and London these days. He was talking about the air force of Saudi Arabia, that great friend of the West, bombing his friends and neighbours in Sana'a, the capital of Yemen.

The Saudi Arabian bombing campaign in Yemen is now eighteen months old, and is responsible for the great majority of the estimated 5,000 civilian fatal casualties in that time. The Saudi authorities swear that it wasn't them every time there is an especially high death toll - "(our) forces have clear instructions not to target populated areas and to avoid civilians" is the familiar refrain - but they are the only side in the conflict that has aircraft.

A case in point is last Sunday's strike on the Great Hall in Sana'a, a very large and distinctive building of no military importance whatever. Last Sunday it was crowded with hundred of people attending the funeral of Ali al-Rawishan, the father of the current interior minister, Galal al-Rawishan.

The younger al-Rawishan is the interior minister in the government that sits in the capital, which is supported by "rebel" Houthi tribesmen from the north of Yemen and by the part of the army that still backs the former president, Ali Abdullah Saleh. His father's funeral was therefore attended by many senior Houthi officials and supporters of the former president, as well as large numbers of other people.

By the sheerest coincidence, we are asked to believe, an air...