Exclusive - Fearless Yemeni Women Take up Arms to Fight Houthishttps://english.aawsat.com/home/article/1694596/exclusive-fearless-yemeni-women-take-arms-fight-houthis
Exclusive - Fearless Yemeni Women Take up Arms to Fight Houthis
A Yemeni woman holds a weapon in the port city of Aden's Dar Saad suburb, on April 22, 2015. (AFP)
Atrocities committed by the Iran-backed Houthi militias in Yemen have forced Yemeni women vigilantes to take up arms, putting behind them their country’s traditions, which long-sheltered females from conflict and violence.
Dozens of women have braved Houthi militants, fearlessly engaging in combat and marching in anti-Houthi protests in some of the country’s hottest war zones.
Hanaa Hussein al-Namsha is one of those women who will be remembered as fierce among tribes in her home province of Hajjah, where she fell to Houthi bullets.
The militants drove up to her front door on March 10, shot her in a hail of bullets and also killed her brother. Holding the dead body hostage, Houthis provoked Namsha into marching, guns blazing, into her home one last time.
Militants drove up to her house on March 10 and shot her brother in a hail of bullets. Holding the dead body hostage, Houthis provoked Namsha into heading into her house to fetch her Kalashnikov rifle to confront them. She managed to kill three gunmen and injure eight before running out of ammunition and being killed by the Houthis.
Another heroine is Asila Al Dohahi. Born in the war-torn country’s historic Dhafar region, she was transformed into a defender of the people and iconic resistance figure before even turning 20. She took up arms shortly after her brother was shot dead by the militants. She was killed by Houthi sniper fire during a clash that saw her take out at least four militants.
Zeinab al-Qaissy, a medical school graduate, has also made herself a name in resisting and fighting against oppressive Houthi gunmen seeking to overrun her hometown.
Over the last few days, Yemeni activists posted pictures showing Qaissy fighting at battlefronts, raising morale among her male comrades and pushing them forward to shield her hometown in Ad Dali' province from Houthi attacks.
Before taking up arms, she was helping wounded fighters operate the country’s first medical aid responders. But as the militias scaled up their attacks, Qaissy took up arms in defense of her homeland.
The Houthis have brutally tortured, jailed, murdered and uprooted hundreds of women arbitrarily in Sanaa and other areas under their control, according to government and local human rights reports.
Bethlehem Camp's 'Lifeline' Football Field Faces Israeli Demolitionhttps://english.aawsat.com/features/5221202-bethlehem-camps-lifeline-football-field-faces-israeli-demolition
Displaced Palestinian youths take part in a training session at the Aida Refugee Camp's football pitch, next to the separation wall outside Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank, on December 16, 2025, a few weeks after an Israeli military decision to demolish the field. (AFP)
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Bethlehem Camp's 'Lifeline' Football Field Faces Israeli Demolition
Displaced Palestinian youths take part in a training session at the Aida Refugee Camp's football pitch, next to the separation wall outside Bethlehem in the occupied West Bank, on December 16, 2025, a few weeks after an Israeli military decision to demolish the field. (AFP)
Earlier this month a group of Palestinian boys turned out to train at their local football pitch in the shadow of the wall separating Israel from the West Bank's Aida refugee camp -- and found a note at the gate.
The children took the ominous message from Israeli authorities to Muhannad Abu Srour, sports director at the Aida Youth Center in the camp near Bethlehem, and the news was not good.
"We were shocked to discover that it was a decision to demolish Aida camp's football field," Abu Srour told AFP, adding that more than 500 children regularly train on the field roughly half the size of a regulation soccer pitch.
"The football field is the only open space we have. If the field is taken away, the children's dream is taken away," Abu Srour said.
The planned destruction of the Aida field is one of many points of contention in the occupied West Bank, but it is a particularly painful one for young Palestinians yearning for a better future.
One of the older members, 18-year-old Abdallah al-Ansurur, hopes to make it into the national Palestinian team, and, like many other youth at Aida camp, took his first steps in the game on the pitch flanked by the eight-meter concrete Israeli wall.
"I started when I was about 13 years old. This field gave me a real opportunity to train," said Ansurur, who was born and raised in Aida camp, one of the smallest in the West Bank.
Ansurur, who trains to be a goalkeeper, calls the astroturf-covered piece of land a "lifeline".
"Without this field, I wouldn't have had this chance. If it didn't exist, we'd be playing in the streets -- or not playing at all," he said.
Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967 and frequently demolishes Palestinian homes or infrastructure, arguing they were built without permits.
AFP was shown the note from COGAT, the Israeli defense ministry body in charge of Palestinian civilian affairs, which says the field was not authorized.
But Anton Salman, who was mayor of adjacent Bethlehem when the field was built in 2021, told AFP the construction was legal.
Salman said his municipality leased the land from the Armenian Church authorities to whom it belongs, before allowing Aida camp's popular committee to manage it for the benefit of residents.
Saeed al-Azzeh, head of the popular committee, confirmed the information, calling the space, "the only breathing space" for camp residents.
"Today, more than 7,000 people live on the same piece of land. Streets are narrow, alleys are cramped -- there is nowhere else," Azzeh said, referring to the camp.
Like other Palestinian refugee camps, Aida was built to accommodate some of the hundreds of thousands of people who either fled their homes or were forced out during the creation of Israel in 1948.
With time, tents gave way to concrete buildings, with the football field representing one of the few open spaces in the camp's dense patchwork.
Abu Srour is proud of what came out of the field, with youth sports delegations able to travel abroad to play, a welcome escape from the West Bank's myriad restrictions.
This is because checkpoints, a fixture of the West Bank since the start of Israel's occupation, have multiplied since the start of the war in Gaza.
Abu Srour mentioned that bringing a local team to Ramallah, a city 20 kilometers (12.5 miles) away as the crow flies, took six hours recently, instead of one hour in the past.
Restricted mobility is a major issue for most Palestinian athletes as it makes it nearly impossible for athletes of similar levels from different cities to train together.
Waseem Abu Sal, who was the first Palestinian boxer to participate in the Olympics, told AFP he frequently sparred with athletes of different levels or weight categories for lack of mobility.
Taking a short break from running a practice for 50 excited five- to 10-year-old boys, coach Mahmud Jandia told AFP he hoped the field would remain.
"Yes, the wall is there -- it feels like a prison -- but despite that, the most important thing is that the field remains and the children keep playing."
"If the field is demolished, all the children's dreams will be demolished with it."
Worn Banknotes, Tobacco Taxes: How Hamas Pays Its Membershttps://english.aawsat.com/features/5220957-worn-banknotes-tobacco-taxes-how-hamas-pays-its-members
Worn Banknotes, Tobacco Taxes: How Hamas Pays Its Members
Palestinians shop amid the rubble in Khan Younis in southern Gaza, February last year (DPA)
More than two months after a fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hamas took effect in Gaza, the group has steadily reasserted some security control in areas under its authority. Yet for Gaza’s residents, daily economic hardship and deteriorating living conditions show little sign of easing.
Hamas’s popular base, made up of its members, their families, and supporters, remains a key pillar of its strength. Nearly two years of war with Israel have partially disrupted the group’s ability to consistently pay salaries.
During the war, Israel sought to dry up Hamas’s financial network by killing figures responsible for transferring money inside Gaza, as well as raiding currency exchange companies in the occupied West Bank that Israeli authorities said were linked to Palestinian factions.
According to field sources and Hamas officials who spoke to Asharq Al-Awsat, the group faced difficulties and delays in paying salaries regularly at leadership, field and other levels due to security conditions.
It has since resumed partial payments to all its members, including leaders and fighters from the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas’s armed wing, while paying lower rates to its preaching and social apparatus, described as civilian elements.
Where does Hamas get its money?
Sources agree that Hamas has managed to preserve some of its financial resources, including commercial activities inside and outside Gaza. One Hamas source said these business revenues generate income for the group alongside funds received from supporting parties such as Iran and others.
They added that such external support fluctuates, sometimes declining, increasing or arriving with delays for reasons related to the donors.
The source said Hamas faces growing difficulties in transferring funds into Gaza, forcing those overseeing salary payments to rely on whatever cash remains accessible in their reserves or to collect revenues from their own commercial sources.
How are salaries paid?
Sources who receive some of these payments told Asharq Al-Awsat, on condition of anonymity, that salaries and stipends were sometimes paid regularly each month but were also delayed by periods ranging from six weeks to two months.
A Hamas source said salary rates varied and did not exceed 80 percent at best, particularly for leaders and operatives in the Qassam Brigades and at the political level.
Lower percentages were paid to the preaching and social apparatus and other bodies, alongside allocations for activities aimed at supporting the population and what the group calls its popular base.
The source said the lowest rates were paid to government employees at both civilian and military levels, reaching 60 percent at most before declining in recent months to around 35 percent.
Several sources said Hamas continues to pay stipends to the families of its members and leaders killed over decades of its activities, as well as to prisoners and wounded fighters.
They added that the group also supports families whose salaries were cut by the Palestinian Authority, continues to provide social assistance and allocates funds to projects aimed at supporting its popular base, including food aid, water provision and communal kitchens, in coordination with foreign institutions.
Asked how salaries are delivered, Hamas sources said payments are made through tight networks and by hand to avoid Israeli monitoring of electronic wallets and banks.
Worn banknotes and tobacco taxes
As Hamas relies on manual delivery, questions remain over how it secures cash under Israel’s blockade. A Hamas source said the process was complex and could not be disclosed for security reasons.
Local sources outside Hamas said the group depends heavily on traders to obtain cash, alongside its existing cash reserves and revenues from businesses it operates.
One source said Hamas often pays worn banknotes to government employees in particular, and to a lesser extent to Qassam fighters and political figures. This forces recipients to manage on their own as most traders refuse to accept damaged or worn currency.
Hamas has encouraged some small traders, especially fruit and vegetable sellers, to accept such notes in exchange for continued support and access to goods at lower prices.
Another source said Hamas has imposed taxes on certain goods, such as tobacco products, to raise funds, noting that most cigarette traders deal in cash rather than electronic wallets, which many Gaza residents now rely on.
Israeli accusations against Iran
On Dec. 7, Israel accused Iran of supporting what it described as a banking network transferring hundreds of thousands of dollars to Hamas. Israel said the network consisted of Gaza-based money changers residing in Türkiye who exploit the country’s financial infrastructure for what it called terrorist purposes.
According to Israel, the network operated in full cooperation with the Iranian regime, transferring funds to Hamas and its leaders and managing wide ranging economic activity involving receiving money from Iran, storing it and transferring it to Hamas via Türkiye.
Israel published the identities of three individuals, including an official in Hamas’s financial apparatus and two money changers from Gaza, claiming they worked under the direction of Khalil al-Hayya.
Sources familiar with the two men told Asharq Al-Awsat they have lived outside Gaza for many years.
One was known to work with various Palestinian factions and had previously smuggled funds for them, including through tunnels along the Egyptian border, while also operating as a businessman in multiple fields beyond currency exchange.
Hamas sources dismissed the accusations as baseless, saying the group has its own methods for transferring funds.
They said Hamas often faces difficulties moving money from abroad into Gaza, a problem that also affects the West Bank due to Israeli pursuit and Palestinian Authority security pressure, though conditions there are better than in Gaza for transferring funds.
Sources from other Palestinian factions said they are also suffering financial crises and difficulties paying salaries and stipends to their members and leaders.
They said they sometimes distribute food aid and other assistance to help their members and families cope with harsh economic conditions, with most of the support coming through institutions backed by Iran or other parties.
Shadow Battles in Syria: Fighting ISIS, Rebuilding the State https://english.aawsat.com/features/5220371-shadow-battles-syria-fighting-isis-rebuilding-state%C2%A0
An aerial photograph shows thousands of people celebrating the first anniversary since the ousting of longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad near The Damascus Sword monument in Umayyad Square, in the Syrian capital Damascus on December 8, 2025. (AFP)
Shadow Battles in Syria: Fighting ISIS, Rebuilding the State
An aerial photograph shows thousands of people celebrating the first anniversary since the ousting of longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad near The Damascus Sword monument in Umayyad Square, in the Syrian capital Damascus on December 8, 2025. (AFP)
At the entrances to Damascus branching off the Mezzeh highway, just before Umayyad Square, young men with a quasi-military appearance line both sides of the road, selling flags and banners for “Liberation Day.”
In narrower streets and at intersections leading deeper into the city, they are met by women in long dresses, some with headscarves pulled halfway across their faces. The women drag one or two children behind them and carry loaves of bread for sale, stacking them openly and thrusting them toward passersby and car windows — unwrapped, exposed to diesel fumes and the dust rising from the rubble encircling the capital.
Selling bread in this manner has gradually become a “profession,” largely female, expanding as poverty deepens. Women queue at bakeries to purchase their ration, resell it for a small margin, then return to the lines, repeating the cycle late into the night.
This scene is not confined to Damascus; it recurs across Syrian cities and regions I visited, from Homs and Idlib to Aleppo. Over time, this female presence has become woven into the landscape of a prolonged crisis, a quiet pillar of daily survival.
Widespread destruction
If women’s exhausted faces and roughened hands are the clearest witnesses to a catastrophe now nearing its fifteenth year, the unrelenting destruction bears equally stark testimony. Entire neighborhoods and suburbs, flattened to the ground, ring Damascus, choking it in dust and debris.
The same gray desolation dominates major cities and their surrounding countryside, stretching across vast expanses of the country. Driving more than 350 kilometers without encountering a single intact tree, neighborhood, or home offers a visceral sense of what over a decade of killing, destruction, and vengeance has left behind.
The scale of devastation reflects not only military confrontations or the superiority of one side, but a deliberate effort to annihilate people and livelihoods, to extinguish even the faintest hope of return. What bombs spared was often burned, looted, or rendered uninhabitable. And yet, returns are taking place slowly, haltingly, through sheer individual persistence.
Only a few enclaves have endured in Damascus and its markets, or beyond in certain towns and districts, some even prospering, driven by sectarian calculations or political and commercial interests, most notably those tied to the production and trafficking of captagon.
A view of Damascus, Syria. (Asharq Al-Awsat)
Damascus: The polished façade
Damascus was preparing for exceptional celebrations marking the first anniversary of Bashar al-Assad’s ouster. Preparations were extensive: stages erected, loudspeakers installed, traffic rerouted, and banners raised proclaiming national unity, “One people... one nation”, and announcing that “the dark era has ended.”
Programs circulated via text messages urging citizens to participate and “celebrate freedom and hope... and complete the story.” But which story? The question reverberates through streets where bread is sold on bare asphalt while victory celebrations unfold.
Here, narratives multiply and diverge, sometimes to the point of contradiction, like neighboring bubbles that coexist without touching. A sharp vertical divide in perspectives remains, recalling 2011, when Syrians split to the brink between supporters and opponents, even as official discourse insists on projecting a seamless image of a new phase.
Silent security battle
Behind the celebratory façade, another battle is underway, which is quieter and more complex. “ISIS, especially the muhajireen [foreign fighters], poses our most serious challenge,” a senior Syrian security source who requested anonymity told Asharq Al-Awsat, noting that arrests and “neutralizations” are carried out regularly.
Another source explained that “security operations are conducted with precision and professionalism. Lists of those affiliated with extremist organizations under the broad ISIS umbrella are already in the hands of the security services.”
He added: “We know them individually. We monitor them closely. The former regime left behind an extremely detailed surveillance system that we continue to rely on.”
I met both sources days before the recent Palmyra incident. When it occurred, it appeared unsurprising; officials and those in sensitive positions had anticipated such scenarios as among several looming security risks, especially after Syria formally joined the counterterrorism coalition.
One source summarized these risks as three simultaneous confrontations: “First, the fight against ISIS and its offshoots, handled with extreme caution because it poses a personal threat to President Ahmed al-Sharaa. Second, the confrontation with the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which threatens the emerging state and its identity over the long term. Third, a colder, less intense standoff with Israel linked to developments in Sweida.”
In a semi-official assessment, the security source did not rule out that those released from al-Hol camp could become “time bombs,” exploited to destabilize internal security and serve the agendas of extremists rejecting the current transition of power.
Such incidents could also signal abroad that stripping the SDF of its “counterterrorism” duties would be futile, potentially “opening the door to packs of lone wolves.”
Destruction from fighting between the regime forces and opposition is seen in the Yarmuk camp on the outskirts of Damascus. (EPA)
Is a security approach enough?
The challenge confronting the state is not purely a security one, and a strictly securitized approach lacks consensus even within governing circles.
Contrary to those who view ISIS and extremism as a “technical problem” solvable through force alone, a figure close to the political leadership argues that “the core issue lies in absorbing a massive human bloc that spent years outside any normal social framework, without education, stable families, or organized structures of life.”
“The real challenge,” he added, “is integrating them into the idea of the state and rehabilitating them accordingly. Just as these adolescents were once pulled toward a specific form of extremism, today we must work to move them toward a middle ground.”
“If the president says we are leaving a factional phase and entering a state-based one, how does that happen at the grassroots level? Is it merely individual and security-driven, or is it societal as well?” he wondered.
In this light, one observer interpreted al-Sharaa’s statement — “Obey me so long as I obey God among you” — delivered from the Umayyad Mosque on the night of the grand celebration and widely criticized by civil and secular circles, as a message aimed at a different audience: a segment the state seeks to reassure through a religious call to obedience and rejection of rebellion.
If words come easily, lived reality does not.
Security is tightly enforced in major cities, such as Damascus and Aleppo, through heavy deployments and modern technologies, including drones, especially during sensitive periods like mass anniversary celebrations.
Beyond the cities, however, vast rural areas remain largely neglected, marked by immense destruction, extreme poverty, and rampant unemployment. Checkpoints line major inter-provincial roads, but side towns and village alleys are often left to fend for themselves.
Idlib, once cited as an exception for its services and administrative capacity, has lost much of that distinction since liberation. Opening to the rest of Syria exposed the city and its devastated countryside to the demands of ordinary life, revealing governance that had amounted largely to crisis management. That legacy persists even in everyday language: soldiers addressing civilians as “sheikh,” or telling them to “seek God’s help” as shorthand for “move along.”
Between Idlib’s countryside and Aleppo, villages and small towns are known for particular loyalties and affiliations — some far removed from the moderation celebrated on Damascus stages. Their reputations lead drivers to take longer routes considered “safer.”
In this belt, young men, especially the youngest, have long served as fuel for armed factions. In recent years, only Hayat Tahrir al-Sham maintained dominance on the ground.
After the fall of the regime, thousands joined the general security forces or the army, often for lack of alternatives. Many cannot afford to rebuild destroyed homes or recover looted livelihoods; barracks, offering food and shelter, remain preferable to civilian life.
A fabric of clashing identities
These identities crystallized during years of militarization, particularly after 2013, though their social roots run deeper. Today, anyone associated with the new authority is often labeled “Idlibi,” after Idlib — the stronghold of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham for nine years — a term frequently tinged with condescension in Damascus and Aleppo. Understanding the social and economic distinctions among these rural communities helps explain their divergent political and military choices.
Some towns, organized around extended families, land ownership, and later labor migration beginning in the mid-1980s, invested in education and professional paths while maintaining a socially rooted religiosity. These communities had previously experienced nationalist and Arabist currents before Baathist authoritarianism took hold.
Others, smaller towns built around sub-clans, relied on seasonal agriculture and service in the police and security apparatus of the former regime. They welcomed their sons’ joining the Nusra Front when it began recruiting, seeing in it both as an organized military path against Assad and a religious identity long suppressed.
Added to this are vast desert regions governed by tribal structures and shifting systems of mutual aid.
Though all are Arab Sunnis, their behaviors, loyalties, and alignments differed, shaping how radical factions penetrated some communities while failing in others, often setting one group against another.
Syrian security forces detain a suspect during an anti-ISIS operation in the Idlib countryside on December 1. (Syrian Interior Ministry)
Idlib and the keys to Damascus
When security officials say today they know extremists “one by one,” they rely partly on Hayat Tahrir al-Sham’s security apparatus and its accumulated knowledge of radical factions it fought in recent years, such as Jund al-Aqsa and the al-Qaeda-aligned Hurras al-Din, along with informant networks.
Idlib remains, to a significant extent, a secure stronghold holding key levers of power. Courts, administrative bodies, and civil registries still operate under the “Sharia courts” established in mid-2013, unlike other regions, especially Damascus, where transactions are centralized.
Sources identify three main recruitment pathways used by ISIS and its offshoots: ideological recruitment, the fastest and most effective, especially among youth who embraced extremism and have yet to absorb Syria’s rapid changes; recruitment driven by money and revenge amid pervasive poverty and lost status; and recruitment among foreign fighters, embittered by abandonment and with little left to lose.
The emerging state and the ‘Sahwa’ model
When President al-Sharaa returned from Washington, he carried a daunting mandate: to “confront and dismantle terrorist networks” linked to remnants of ISIS, Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, Hezbollah, and Hamas, according to US envoy to Syria Tom Barrack.
While Israel has targeted Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza, Syria must contend with their residual networks. Yet the greater challenge remains ISIS and its offshoots, fighters who, until recently, were close “brothers in arms” to Hayat Tahrir al-Sham.
As observers await the form this confrontation will take, particularly in the absence of a unified army with a clear doctrine, Washington’s earlier experiment in post-Saddam Iraq looms large: the Sunni-on-Sunni “Awakening” (Sahwa).
The Sahwa rested on what an informed Iraqi source described as a “coalition of the harmed” from al-Qaeda, centered in Anbar province with its Sunni Arab identity and traditional religiosity. A similar model could emerge in Syria through an alliance of communities damaged by ISIS in the north and northeast, led by the emerging state that wants to fight extremism.
The Iraqi source, who closely followed the Sahwa’s rise and subsequent decline under then Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, noted that tribes around Ramadi, especially al-Bourisha, al-Buallwan, al-Bou Fahd, and to a lesser extent al-Dulaim, formed the backbone of the fight after al-Qaeda devastated their trade and social fabric.
Syria's interim president, Ahmed al-Sharaa, greets people as he attends celebrations marking the first anniversary of the ousting of former President Bashar al-Assad in Damascus, Syria, Monday, Dec. 8, 2025. (AP)
Though some were coerced into allegiance, clashes never fully ceased, culminating in atrocities such as the massacre of the al-Bu Nimr tribe, where nearly 2,000 men were executed. A Syrian parallel is the al-Shaitat tribe, which resisted ISIS and suffered one of the largest massacres, with around 1,800 young men killed.
Those who joined the Sahwa were required to publicly renounce al-Qaeda and integrate into security forces coordinated with US troops, in hopes of transforming that tribal bloc into a political actor.
From arms to politics
The Iraqi source highlighted a central lesson: despite the Sahwa’s security successes, it failed to transition into meaningful political participation. When its leaders entered elections, they achieved little representation and failed to build durable popular support.
That failure mirrors Syria’s core dilemma today: the collective transition from a factional, militarized reality confined to limited geography toward a state defined by broader political and administrative principles — and, militarily, by the monopoly of force within a single national army.
Between a woman selling bread on a street corner, a young man dancing in a public square, and institutions struggling to impose order and define the state, Syria appears as a country of overlapping bubbles: a glossy façade prepared for celebration, like a carefully designed postcard, and beneath it a fragile social and security depth whose battles remain unresolved.
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