Signal breach exposes flippant attitude to civilian deaths

Nearly 60 people, including children, have been killed as the United States expands its two-week bombing campaign in Yemen to include (according to a review by the Associated Press) "firing at ranking personnel as well as dropping bombs in cities." This comes as recently exposed Signal messages between senior US officials discussing the air-strikes demonstrated a flippant attitude towards the lives of Yemeni civilians. In one disturbing exchange concerning an apparent strike on a civilian apartment building, National Security Advisor Mike Waltz writes: "The first target—their top missile guy—we had positive ID of him walking into his girlfriend's building and it's now collapsed." "Excellent," comes the reply from Vice President JD Vance. The messages, which were brought to light after a journalist from The Atlantic was mistakenly added to the officials' group chat in a staggering breach of normal security protocols, show a callous indifference to the ethical implications of bombing civilian areas. This is perhaps unsurprising for a country that provided many of the planes and trained many of the pilots involved in the Saudi-led bombing campaign that killed over 9,000 Yemenis between 2015 and 2022.

From The New Humanitairan, March 28.

US in new wave of air-strikes on Yemen

US airstrikes on the Ras Issa oil port on April 17 killed at least 71 people and wounded more than 170, according to the Houthi rebels. The US military said it targeted the facility to cut off a key source of the Houthis' fuel and revenue. The strikes were part of an intensified US bombing campaign in response to Houthi attacks on Red Sea shipping and Israel linked to the Gaza war. Most of Yemen's humanitarian supplies enter the war-torn country through the main ports of Ras Issa, Hodeidah and Salif. (TNH)