Houthi Escalation in Taiz, Marib Undermines Peace Efforts, Truce

A general view of Taiz city that has been besieged by the Houthis for eight years. (Saba)
A general view of Taiz city that has been besieged by the Houthis for eight years. (Saba)
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Houthi Escalation in Taiz, Marib Undermines Peace Efforts, Truce

A general view of Taiz city that has been besieged by the Houthis for eight years. (Saba)
A general view of Taiz city that has been besieged by the Houthis for eight years. (Saba)

The Iran-backed Houthi militias kicked off Eid al-Fitr celebrations in Yemen by committing more crimes in violation of the fragile calm that had prevailed in the country and that had given hope that the militants would agree to a permanent peace roadmap sought by Saudi Arabia and Oman.

The Houthis shelled civilian areas in the western countryside of the Taiz province, killing three civilians, including a child, and wounding nine others.

Local and medical sources identified the child as 12-year-old Najwa Hassan Moqbel Bshaj and the two other victims as Mohammed Abdulbaset al-Habishi and his sister Mariam, reported the Saba news agency.

The wounded suffered various injuries, some serious, added the sources. They are being treated in Mokha city. The sources warned that the death toll from the shelling could rise.

Saba said the attack is part of the daily crimes committed by the terrorist Houthis to “thwart local and regional peace efforts and continue to spill the blood of Yemenis.”

Meanwhile, the Houthis blew up three houses in the Sirwah district in the Marib province on Friday, which was the first day of Eid, revealed a local rights group.

The “Mousawat” rights and freedoms group said the Houthis blew up the homes of Saleh bin Saleh al-Dawla, Abdullah Saleh al-Dawla, and Saleh Nasser al-Dawla al-Jahmy in al-Zour village in Marib.

In a statement, it revealed that the latest attack brought to nine the total number of houses blown up by the Houthis since mid-February as part of their systematic terrorization and forced displacement of opponents.



Israeli Likud Party Ministers Urge Netanyahu to Annex West Bank

Israeli soldiers in Tubas in the north of the occupied West Bank on September 11, 2024. (AFP)
Israeli soldiers in Tubas in the north of the occupied West Bank on September 11, 2024. (AFP)
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Israeli Likud Party Ministers Urge Netanyahu to Annex West Bank

Israeli soldiers in Tubas in the north of the occupied West Bank on September 11, 2024. (AFP)
Israeli soldiers in Tubas in the north of the occupied West Bank on September 11, 2024. (AFP)

Cabinet ministers in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud party called on Wednesday for Israel to annex the Israeli-occupied West Bank before the Knesset recesses at the end of the month.

They issued a petition ahead of Netanyahu's meeting next week with US President Donald Trump, where discussions are expected to center on a potential 60-day Gaza ceasefire and hostage release deal with Hamas.

The petition was signed by 15 cabinet ministers and Amir Ohana, speaker of the Knesset, Israel's parliament.

There was no immediate response from the prime minister's office. Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer, long a confidant of Netanyahu, did not sign the petition. He has been in Washington since Monday for talks on Iran and Gaza.

"We ministers and members of Knesset call for applying Israeli sovereignty and law immediately on Judea and Samaria," they wrote, using the biblical names for the West Bank captured by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war.

Their petition cited Israel's recent achievements against both Iran and Iran's allies and the opportunity afforded by the strategic partnership with the US and support of Trump.

It said the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack on Israel demonstrated that the concept of Jewish settlement blocs alongside the establishment of a Palestinian state poses an existential threat to Israel.

"The task must be completed, the existential threat removed from within, and another massacre in the heart of the country must be prevented," the petition stated.

Most countries regard Jewish settlements in the West Bank, many of which cut off Palestinian communities from one another, as a violation of international law.

With each advance of Israeli settlements and roads, the West Bank becomes more fractured, further undermining prospects for a contiguous land on which Palestinians could build a sovereign state long envisaged in Middle East peacemaking.

Israel's pro-settler politicians have been emboldened by the return to the White House of Trump, who has proposed Palestinians leave Gaza, a suggestion widely condemned across the Middle East and beyond.