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Wheat Imports Through Hodeidah Port Decline 54% After Israeli Strikes

A crane at a container terminal at the Red Sea port of Hodeidah. (Reuters)
A crane at a container terminal at the Red Sea port of Hodeidah. (Reuters)
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Wheat Imports Through Hodeidah Port Decline 54% After Israeli Strikes

A crane at a container terminal at the Red Sea port of Hodeidah. (Reuters)
A crane at a container terminal at the Red Sea port of Hodeidah. (Reuters)

A recent report by the United Nations and the Yemeni government revealed a substantial decline in wheat imports through the Houthi-controlled Hodeidah port, following Israeli airstrikes and attacks by the Iran-backed Houthi militias on international shipping.

The report also showed that local currency in government-controlled areas sustained declining trend against the US Dollar, decreasing by 2% month-on-month, reaching a historic low of 1,904 Yemeni rial per 1 US dollar in August 2024.

The UN report on Yemen market and trade said that over the last two years, the rial in government-controlled areas has substantially depreciated, losing 26% of its value year-on-year and 38% against the 3-year average.

The weakening of the rial in those areas is primarily because of depleted foreign exchange reserves, which recently deepened by the banking sector disruptions.

Meanwhile, stringent exchange rate regulations in Houthi-held areas have helped maintain exchange rate stability despite US dollar shortages. However, the ongoing banking crisis poses a risk of heightened currency depreciation in both areas, the report warned.

Food imports increased by 33% in August compared to the previous month but remained slightly below the levels observed a year ago.

Wheat imports through main ports (Al Saleef and Aden) increased in August 2024; however, they remained lower than the peak levels of April and May and those of August 2023.

In contrast, data showed that wheat imports volumes through Hodeidah significantly decreased by more than half (54%) month-on-month, partly due to the ongoing Red Sea attacks on transit ships, recent attacks on Hodeidah Port and delays in supplier contracts.

Fuel and essential commodities

The report showed that despite these challenges, essential food commodities, petrol and diesel were amply available in most markets nationwide during August 2024.

Overall, it said significant shortages are not anticipated in the short-term, owing to a 12% increase in wheat imports via the three ports (Al Saleef, Hodeidah and Aden) between January and August 2024 compared to the same period in 2023, as well as high prepositioning in April and May.

Fuel prices in government-controlled areas continued to increase modestly in August 2024, while remaining stable in Houthi-held areas.

In August 2024, diesel and petrol prices in government-controlled areas increased slightly by 4% compared to the previous month, whereas prices remained relatively stable in Houthi-held areas, primarily due to price controls.

However, when compared to the same period in 2023 and the three-year average, diesel and petrol prices in government areas saw a significant increase, rising by 29 – 30% and 45 – 50%, respectively.

Conversely, Houthi-held areas saw relative stability year-on-year and reported a decrease of 9 – 12% compared to the three-year average.

The report said the increase in fuel prices in government-held areas is attributed to the depreciation of the local currency against the US Dollar and the slight decline import volumes through Aden and other Arabian Sea Ports during the first eight months of 2024 compared to the same period last year.

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Arab World

Israel Cracks Down on Palestinian Citizens Who Speak out against the War in Gaza

The Palestinian health ministry in Gaza said Friday that hospitals have only two days' fuel left before they must restrict services, after the UN warned aid delivery to the war-devastated territory is being crippled. - AFP
The Palestinian health ministry in Gaza said Friday that hospitals have only two days' fuel left before they must restrict services, after the UN warned aid delivery to the war-devastated territory is being crippled. - AFP
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Israel Cracks Down on Palestinian Citizens Who Speak out against the War in Gaza

The Palestinian health ministry in Gaza said Friday that hospitals have only two days' fuel left before they must restrict services, after the UN warned aid delivery to the war-devastated territory is being crippled. - AFP
The Palestinian health ministry in Gaza said Friday that hospitals have only two days' fuel left before they must restrict services, after the UN warned aid delivery to the war-devastated territory is being crippled. - AFP

Israel’s yearlong crackdown against Palestinian citizens who speak out against the war in Gaza is prompting many to self-censor out of fear of being jailed and further marginalized in society, while some still find ways to dissent — carefully.
Ahmed Khalefa's life turned upside down after he was charged with inciting terrorism for chanting in solidarity with Gaza at an anti-war protest in October 2023, The Associated Press said.
The lawyer and city counselor from central Israel says he spent three difficult months in jail followed by six months detained in an apartment. It's unclear when he'll get a final verdict on his guilt or innocence. Until then, he's forbidden from leaving his home from dusk to dawn.
Khalefa is one of more than 400 Palestinian citizens of Israel who, since the start of the war in Gaza, have been investigated by police for “incitement to terrorism” or “incitement to violence,” according to Adalah, a legal rights group for minorities. More than half of those investigated were also criminally charged or detained, Adalah said.
“Israel made it clear they see us more as enemies than as citizens,” Khalefa said in an interview at a cafe in his hometown of Umm al-Fahm, Israel's second-largest Palestinian city.
Israel has roughly 2 million Palestinian citizens, whose families remained within the borders of what became Israel in 1948. Among them are Muslims and Christians, and they maintain family and cultural ties to Gaza and the West Bank, which Israel captured in 1967.
Israel says its Palestinian citizens enjoy equal rights, including the right to vote, and they are well-represented in many professions. However, Palestinians are widely discriminated against in areas like housing and the job market.
Israeli authorities have opened more incitement cases against Palestinian citizens during the war in Gaza than in the previous five years combined, Adalah's records show. Israeli authorities have not said how many cases ended in convictions and imprisonment. The Justice Ministry said it did not have statistics on those convictions.
Just being charged with incitement to terrorism or identifying with a terrorist group can land a suspect in detention until they're sentenced, under the terms of a 2016 law.
In addition to being charged as criminals, Palestinians citizens of Israel — who make up around 20% of the country’s population — have lost jobs, been suspended from schools and faced police interrogations posting online or demonstrating, activists and rights watchdogs say.
It’s had a chilling effect.
“Anyone who tries to speak out about the war will be imprisoned and harassed in his work and education,” said Oumaya Jabareen, whose son was jailed for eight months after an anti-war protest. “People here are all afraid, afraid to say no to this war.”
Jabareen was among hundreds of Palestinians who filled the streets of Umm al-Fahm earlier this month carrying signs and chanting political slogans. It appeared to be the largest anti-war demonstration in Israel since the Oct. 7 Hamas attack. But turnout was low, and Palestinian flags and other national symbols were conspicuously absent. In the years before the war, some protests could draw tens of thousands of Palestinians in Israel.
Authorities tolerated the recent protest march, keeping it under heavily armed supervision. Helicopters flew overhead as police with rifles and tear gas jogged alongside the crowd, which dispersed without incident after two hours. Khalefa said he chose not to attend.
Shortly after the Oct. 7 attack, Israel’s far-right government moved quickly to invigorate a task force that has charged Palestinian citizens of Israel with “supporting terrorism” for posts online or protesting against the war. At around the same time, lawmakers amended a security bill to increase surveillance of online activity by Palestinians in Israel, said Nadim Nashif, director of the digital rights group 7amleh. These moves gave authorities more power to restrict freedom of expression and intensify their arrest campaigns, Nashif said.
The task force is led by Itamar Ben-Gvir, a hard-line national security minister who oversees the police. His office said the task force has monitored thousands of posts allegedly expressing support for terror organizations and that police arrested “hundreds of terror supporters,” including public opinion leaders, social media influencers, religious figures, teachers and others.
“Freedom of speech is not the freedom to incite ... which harms public safety and our security,” his office said in a statement.
But activists and rights groups say the government has expanded its definition of incitement much too far, targeting legitimate opinions that are at the core of freedom of expression.
Myssana Morany, a human rights attorney at Adalah, said Palestinian citizens have been charged for seemingly innocuous things like sending a meme of a captured Israeli tank in Gaza in a private WhatsApp group chat. Another person was charged for posting a collage of children’s photos, captioned in Arabic and English: “Where were the people calling for humanity when we were killed?” The feminist activist group Kayan said over 600 women called its hotline because of blowback in the workplace for speaking out against the war or just mentioning it unfavorably.
Over the summer, around two dozen anti-war protesters in the port city of Haifa were only allowed to finish three chants before police forcefully scattered the gathering into the night. Yet Jewish Israelis demanding a hostage release deal protest regularly — and the largest drew hundreds of thousands to the streets of Tel Aviv.
Khalefa, the city counselor, is not convinced the crackdown on speech will end, even if the war eventually does. He said Israeli prosecutors took issue with slogans that broadly praised resistance and urged Gaza to be strong, but which didn’t mention violence or any militant groups. For that, he said, the government is trying to disbar him, and he faces up to eight years in prison.
“They wanted to show us the price of speaking out,” Khalefa said.