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Is the US Serious About Destroying the Houthis’ Military Capabilities?

Many Yemenis are skeptical of Washington’s commitment to weaken the military capabilities of the Houthis in Yemen. (AP)
Many Yemenis are skeptical of Washington’s commitment to weaken the military capabilities of the Houthis in Yemen. (AP)
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Is the US Serious About Destroying the Houthis’ Military Capabilities?

Many Yemenis are skeptical of Washington’s commitment to weaken the military capabilities of the Houthis in Yemen. (AP)
Many Yemenis are skeptical of Washington’s commitment to weaken the military capabilities of the Houthis in Yemen. (AP)

Many Yemenis are skeptical of Washington’s commitment to weaken the military capabilities of the Houthis in Yemen. They see the recent strikes on military sites in five Yemeni provinces as nothing more than a proportional response to an attack on a single destroyer.

Expecting a limited impact from the strikes, Yemeni observers compared them to the US approach against Iranian-backed groups in Iraq.

Col. Sadeq Dweid, the spokesperson for the National Resistance Forces led by Gen. Tareq Saleh, a member of Yemen’s Presidential Leadership Council (PLC), dismissed the recent airstrikes by the US and UK on Houthi targets as “not serious.”

He argued that foreign intervention is “not a solution and is unacceptable.”

Dweid said these strikes are part of internal maneuvering, emphasizing instead the importance of supporting the Yemeni government as the only legitimate representative of the country.

Many activists and residents share this view, believing that Washinton’s announcement to the Houthis that it intends to retaliate against them is confirmation that the aim wasn’t the destruction of the militias’ military capabilities, but simply a response to their targeting of an American destroyer in the Red Sea.

The militias had fired 24 drones and six ballistic and naval missiles against the vessel.

Yemeni journalist Fares Al-Humairi said the US and British strikes on Houthi-held areas hit positions which are not of strategic importance and others which don’t offer any support to the operations the militias are carrying out in the Red Sea.

Before the strikes, the Houthis moved weapons, including over 100 naval missiles, from dismantled military bases in Hodeidah to storage facilities, noted Al-Humairi.

Yemeni teacher Ahmed Abdulhameed said the US will handle the Houthis the same way it handled Iranian groups in Iraq - responding with limited strikes to each provocation.

He noted that Washington chooses to overlook the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) in Iraq even though it an Iran-aligned group.

Abdullah Yahya echoed these remarks, saying the targeted locations hold no military significance to the Houthis.

Moreover, he explained that the militias, with help from the Iranian Revolutionary Guards and Hezbollah, are experienced in disassembling rockets and concealing them in caves or the dense palm tree farms near the Red Seas coast.

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Lebanon's Public Schools Reopen amid War and Displacement

Children playing in a shelter center for displaced people in the town of Marwaniyah in South Lebanon (AP)
Children playing in a shelter center for displaced people in the town of Marwaniyah in South Lebanon (AP)
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Lebanon's Public Schools Reopen amid War and Displacement

Children playing in a shelter center for displaced people in the town of Marwaniyah in South Lebanon (AP)
Children playing in a shelter center for displaced people in the town of Marwaniyah in South Lebanon (AP)

In the quiet seaside town of Amchit, 45 minutes north of Beirut, public schools are finally in session again, alongside tens of thousands of internally displaced people who have made some of them a makeshift shelter.

As Israeli strikes on Lebanon escalated in September, hundreds of schools in Lebanon were either destroyed or closed due to damage or security concerns, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

Of around 1,250 public schools in Lebanon, 505 schools have also been turned into temporary shelters for some of the 840,000 people internally displaced by the conflict, according to the Lebanese education ministry.

Last month, the ministry started a phased reopening, allowing 175,000 students - 38,000 of whom are displaced - to return to a learning environment that is still far from normal, Reuters reported.

At Amchit Secondary Public School, which now has 300 enrolled students and expects more as displaced families keep arriving, the once-familiar spaces have transformed to accommodate new realities.

Two-and-a-half months ago, the school was chosen as a shelter, school director Antoine Abdallah Zakhia said.

Today, laundry hangs from classroom windows, cars fill the playground that was once a bustling area, and hallways that used to echo with laughter now serve as resting areas for families seeking refuge.

Fadia Yahfoufi, a displaced woman living temporarily at the school, expressed gratitude mixed with longing.

"Of course, we wish to go back to our homes. No one feels comfortable except at home," she said.

Zeina Shukr, another displaced mother, voiced her concerns for her children's education.

"This year has been unfair. Some children are studying while others aren't. Either everyone studies, or the school year should be postponed," she said.

- EDUCATION WON'T STOP

OCHA said the phased plan to resume classes will enrol 175,000 students, including 38,000 displaced children, across 350 public schools not used as shelters.

"The educational process is one of the aspects of resistance to the aggression Lebanon is facing," Education Minister Abbas Halabi told Reuters

Halabi said the decision to resume the academic year was difficult as many displaced students and teachers were not psychologically prepared to return to school.

In an adjacent building at Amchit Secondary Public School, teachers and students are adjusting to a compressed three-day week, with seven class periods each day to maximize learning time.

Nour Kozhaya, a 16-year-old Amchit resident, remains optimistic. "Lebanon is at war, but education won't stop. We will continue to pursue our dreams," she said.

Teachers are adapting to the challenging conditions.

"Everyone is mentally exhausted ... after all this war is on all of us," Patrick Sakr, a 38-year-old physics teacher, said.

For Ahmad Ali Hajj Hassan, a displaced 17-year-old from the Bekaa region, the three-day school week presents a challenge, but not a deterrent.

"These are the conditions. We can study despite them," he said.