Alimi Calls on Int'l Community to Adopt New Approach towards Yemen

President of Yemen’s Presidential Leadership Council (PLC) Rashad al-Alimi addresses the UN General Assembly meeting on Thursday, September 22, 2022. (EPA)
President of Yemen’s Presidential Leadership Council (PLC) Rashad al-Alimi addresses the UN General Assembly meeting on Thursday, September 22, 2022. (EPA)
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Alimi Calls on Int'l Community to Adopt New Approach towards Yemen

President of Yemen’s Presidential Leadership Council (PLC) Rashad al-Alimi addresses the UN General Assembly meeting on Thursday, September 22, 2022. (EPA)
President of Yemen’s Presidential Leadership Council (PLC) Rashad al-Alimi addresses the UN General Assembly meeting on Thursday, September 22, 2022. (EPA)

President of Yemen’s Presidential Leadership Council (PLC) Rashad al-Alimi called on the international community to adopt a new approach towards Yemen and end the humanitarian suffering caused by the Iranian-backed Houthi militias.

Delivering his speech at the high-level debate of the General Assembly in New York on Thursday, Alimi said that the transformative solutions adopted by the UN General Assembly require consolidating clear values of peace-building based on a stable government and a decisive deterrent to protect and facilitate the political process.

He called for finding alternative options that are equivalent to the power of deterrence as long as fears that the use of force will disrupt fragile attempts to reach calm and the terrorist designation will lead to a humanitarian catastrophe remain.

Alimi suggested that the international community backs the legitimate government so that the values ​​of freedom, peace and coexistence prevail, SABA news agency reported.

He also urged the international community to condemn Iran’s interventions in his country’s affairs and called on member states to abide by the UN arms embargo and prevent it from providing its militias with military technologies, such as ballistic missiles and drones that are used in terrorist acts against civilians in Yemen and other regional countries.

As the humanitarian truce is coming to an end, Alimi affirmed that the Yemeni government has adhered to all the elements of the armistice, namely operating regular commercial flights to Sanaa Airport and facilitating the entry of oil derivatives ships to the ports of Hodeidah, in an effort to alleviate the suffering of Yemenis.

He stressed, however, that the militias continue to block the roads of Taiz and other governorates, refuse to pay the salaries of their employees or release prisoners and detainees.

Alimi added that the militias are also trying to find any pretext to thwart the truce and obstruct UN efforts to renew it and build on it to achieve the aspired comprehensive peace.



Israeli Strikes Kill 44 Palestinians in Gaza, UN Warns of Man-Made Drought

Smoke billows after an Israeli strike in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip on June 19, 2025. (AFP)
Smoke billows after an Israeli strike in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip on June 19, 2025. (AFP)
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Israeli Strikes Kill 44 Palestinians in Gaza, UN Warns of Man-Made Drought

Smoke billows after an Israeli strike in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip on June 19, 2025. (AFP)
Smoke billows after an Israeli strike in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip on June 19, 2025. (AFP)

Israeli fire killed at least 44 Palestinians in Gaza on Friday, many of whom had been trying to get food, local officials said, while the United Nations' children's agency warned of a looming man-made drought in the enclave as its water systems collapse. 

At least 25 people awaiting aid trucks were killed by Israeli fire south of Netzarim in central Gaza Strip, the Hamas-run local health authority said. 

Asked by Reuters about the incident, the Israel Defense Force said its troops had fired warning shots at suspected gunmen who advanced in a crowd towards them. 

An Israeli aircraft then "struck and eliminated the suspects", it said in a statement, adding that it was aware of others being hurt in the incident and was conducting a review. 

Separately, Gazan medics said at least 19 others were killed in other Israeli military strikes across the enclave, including 12 people in a house in Deir Al-Balah in central Gaza Strip, taking Friday's total death toll to at least 44. 

In a statement on Friday, the Hamas group, which says Israel is using hunger as a weapon against the population of Gaza, accused Israel of systematically targeting Palestinians seeking food aid across the enclave. Israel denies this and accuses Hamas of stealing food aid, which the group denies. 

Meanwhile UNICEF, the UN's children's agency, warned in Geneva of drought conditions developing in Gaza. 

"Children will begin to die of thirst ... Just 40% of drinking water production facilities remain functional," UNICEF spokesperson James Elder told reporters. "We are way below emergency standards in terms of drinking water." 

UNICEF also reported a 50% increase in children aged six months to 5 years admitted for treatment of malnutrition from April to May in Gaza, and half a million people going hungry. 

FOOD AID 

Elder, who was recently in Gaza, said he had many testimonials of women and children injured while trying to receive food aid, including a young boy who was wounded by a tank shell and later died of his injuries. 

A lack of public clarity on when the sites - some of which are in combat zones - are open is causing mass casualty events, he added. 

The route near Netzarim has become dangerous since the start of a new US-backed aid distribution system run by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), witnesses told Reuters, with desperate Gazans heading to a designated area late at night to try and get something from aid supplies due to be handed out after dawn. 

The route has also been used by aid trucks sent by the United Nations and aid groups, and people have also been heading there in the hope of grabbing bags off trucks. 

UNICEF said GHF was "making a desperate situation worse". 

On Thursday, at least 70 people were killed by Israeli gunfire and military strikes, including 12 people who tried to approach a site operated by the GHF in the central Gaza Strip. 

In an email to Reuters, GHF accused Gazan health officials of regularly releasing inaccurate information. It said Palestinians do not access the nearby GHF site via the Netzarim corridor. The statement did not address a question about whether GHF was aware of Thursday's incident. 

The GHF said in a statement on Thursday it had so far distributed nearly three million meals across three of its aid sites without incident. 

The Red Cross told Reuters that the "vast majority" of patients that arrived at its Field Hospital during mass casualty incidents had reported that they were wounded while trying to access aid, at or around aid distribution points. 

Between May 27 and Thursday, the aid group received 1,874 patients wounded by weapons, according to Red Cross figures. 

The Gaza war was triggered when Palestinian Hamas fighters attacked Israel on October 7, 2023, killing 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages, according to Israeli tallies. 

Israel's subsequent military assault on Gaza has killed nearly 55,700 Palestinians, according to Gaza's health ministry, while displacing almost the entire population of more than 2 million and causing a hunger crisis.