Arabia Infelix

[Elok]

So, uh, there's been this war in Yemen for a while now, pitting the Saudis against some sort of Iran-backed rebels or something. Trying to understand the details makes my head hurt, at least at this hour. Basically it's a territorial pissing match. But I learned tonight that, among other horrible things, seven out of every eight Yemenis are dependent on foreign aid for survival right now. Essentially, they're refugees in their own country. If anything goes wrong with the delivery of aid, 21 million people could die in very short order. The US has done a good deal to aid the Saudis in this fight. You could argue that this might eventually make us complicit in a mass death that would dwarf the Holocaust. Right now we've only helped them wreck the country and, uh, kill about eight hundred kids with bombs. Not sure how many of those are child soldiers "recruited" by the other side.

Is this more or less horrifying than the situation in ISISland, in your opinion? Why do we not hear more about this? Discuss.

[Ben Kenobi]

Because the statement is 100 percent false? Blaming Americans for the problems of Yemen? Really? If anything it's precisely the opposite.

[Aeson]

Lack of water seems to be the mass-scale humanitarian crisis, due to the aquifers drying up. The war is also terrible of course, but in and of itself doesn't have all that much to do with the risk of mass loss of life.

[BeBMan]

Why do we not hear more about this? Discuss.

Wild assumptions: because so far it's not immediately touching western interests and Saudi Arabia, while being a so-called *ally* many ppl rather would not like to be associated with, is a main adversary of both Iran and Russia.

[Elok]

Lack of water seems to be the mass-scale humanitarian crisis, due to the aquifers drying up. The war is also terrible of course, but in and of itself doesn't have all that much to do with the risk of mass loss of life.

Where did you hear that? Not that I doubt you, genuinely curious since what little news coverage I've found mentions no water loss.

[Aeson]

I remember reading a "related article" about the water crisis in Yemen back when California's water crisis was headlining the news. Not sure where exactly, but it was something along these lines:

http://www.theguardian.com/global-development-professionals-network/2015/apr/02/water-scarcity-yemen-conflict

[kentonio]

Because the statement is 100 percent false? Blaming Americans for the problems of Yemen? Really? If anything it's precisely the opposite.

You think we should be blaming Yemen for the problems of America?

[Aeson]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_supply_and_sanitation_in_Yemen

Water resources[edit]

Sana'a, the capital of the Republic of Yemen, is supplied entirely by groundwater, with water levels declining by 6–8 m per year
With renewable water resources of only 125 cubic meters per capita/year Yemen is one of the most water-scarce countries in the world. This level is less than one tenth of the threshold for water stress, which is defined at 1,700 cubic meters per capita/year.[15] Total water demand of 3,400 million cubic metres per year exceeds renewable resources of 2,500 million cubic metres per year, thus leading to a steady decline in groundwater levels, varying between 1 m per year in the Tuban-Abyan area and 6–8 m per year in the Sana’a basin.[16] Today, there are between 45,000 and 70,000 wells in Yemen, the majority of which are under private control. No one can be certain of the exact number, as almost all were drilled without license.[17] Agriculture takes the lion’s share of Yemen’s water resources, sucking up almost 90 percent, and it is estimated that qat production accounts for 37 percent of all water used in irrigation.[17]

Furthermore, climate change has apparently led to a reduction in the level of rainfall. For example, in Sana'a the average rainfall has declined by one third from 240mm (average 1932–1968) to 200mm (1969–1982) and 180mm (1983–2000).[18]

Sana'a[edit]

Sana'a could be the first capital city in the world to run dry. Even today, many wells have to be drilled to depths of 2,600 to 3,900 feet (790 to 1,190 m), extremely deep by world standards. The combined output of the 125 wells operated by the state-owned Sana'a Local Corporation for Water Supply and Sanitation barely meets 35 percent of the growing city's need. The rest is supplied either by small, privately owned networks or by hundreds of mobile tankers. In recent years, as water quality has deteriorated, privately owned kiosks that use reverse osmosis to purify poor-quality groundwater supplies have mushroomed in Sana'a and other towns. Future supply options include pumping desalinated water from the Red Sea over a distance of 155 miles (249 km), over 9,000-foot (2,700 m) mountains into the capital, itself located at an altitude of 7,226 feet (2,202 m). The enormous pumping cost would push the price of water up to $10 per cubic meter.[17]

The Minister for Water and the Environment, Abdulrahman al-Eryani, said in 2007:

The Sana’a basin is using water 10 times faster than Nature is replenishing it. And before long there won’t even be enough to drink. I am not an optimist. I think many of the city's people will simply have to move away. The solution I am proposing is a very clear policy—a voluntary one—of reallocating people from here down to the Red Sea coast. We could use renewable energy there to desalinate sea water. And it would be cheaper than trying to provide enough water to Sana'a. This is not the first time that Yemenis have had to move to avoid disaster. It's happened many times in the last few thousand years, when Nature allowed the population to increase rapidly. This time, though, there are political frontiers in the way of an exodus.[19]

The war of has an effect on this of course, limiting the money and manpower Yemen can devote to addressing the water problem.

[Lorizael]

Lack of water seems to be the mass-scale humanitarian crisis, due to the aquifers drying up. The war is also terrible of course, but in and of itself doesn't have all that much to do with the risk of mass loss of life.

Well, if climate change is the culprit, then it's everybody's fault. Yay!

[Aeson]

If we light our farts we help to save the planet.

[Thoth]

Why do we not hear more about this? Discuss.

Brown people who don't have oil aren't news.

[Dinner]

Oh, the political and economic issues in Yeman, the poorest country in the middle east have been covered at least since 2000 with increasingly dire predictions. A decades long dictatorship which got over thrown by shiia rebels backed by Iran but even before that the dictator's economic policies were positively medieval and locked the country in a level of poverty and lack of education which is rarely equaled outsode of Africa. The Saudis were perfectly happy with Sullah and his dictatorship as at least the dictator was a sunni.

Hell, the real division insode the country are the old cold war north and south yemen with a religious component influencing everything.

[C0ckney]

nice to see a thread on this.

from what i remember essentially what happened in yemen was that saleh was overthrown as part of arab spring and replaced by a new government with the support of the army plus foreign backers. the new president won an election in 2012 with a reported 99.8% of the vote ( ). saleh resigned and handed over power, but there was a fair bit of bloodshed.

the houthis, a shia group that have long chafed under sunni rule, have been fighting an insurgency against the government since the early 2000s; there has been fighting in saudi arabia; much of the fighting has been between the houthis and an islamist party (al-islah) and its allied tribesmen. the situation was unstable and the houthis quietly gained control of several parts of yemen, using popular protests as a cover to smuggle men and weapons to key points. the situation worsened in 2014 when the houthis took control of sana'a, after which the prime minister resigned and the houthis signed a power sharing deal with the other parties. after fierce clashes, the houthis announced they wouldn't participate in the new government, which was nevertheless sworn in. the houthis attacked the presidential palace and hadi's private residence, which caused hadi and his ministers to resign. the houthis then formed a new government, which was not internationally recognised. hadi then escaped, took back his resignation and vowed to fight.

former president saleh by this time was openly in league with the houthis, and their forces have together in several operations. after some vicious fighting, the houthis reached aden, and president hadi was once again forced to flee, this time to saudi arabia. many arab states, led by saudi arabia intervened, and through their combined efforts managed push back the houthis and retake control of most of aden. hadi returned.

it's worth mentioning the role of al-qaida, which had had an increasing presence in eastern yemen during this time. the houthis and other opposition group accuse the government of giving weapons to al-qaida to create a fresh crisis and get the US and gulf states to step up their involvement. this seems to have worked, and there are regular US drone strikes. the US intervened and bombed some houthi targets in 2009-2010 claiming that these operations were against al-qaida. there is also a small islamic state presence in yemen, but it's mostly limited to terrorist attacks.

there is actually very little proven iranian involvement, and there was certainly none at the start. these reports are lies concocted to cover up the embarrassing failures of the allied forces, especially the saudi one in the last conflict.

confused? you may well be. it's a very complex situation, made even more so by the sheer amount of lies spread about the conflict for various reasons. here's a map of the present situation:

[Kidlicious]

Homosexuals are executed in Yemen. It's the fault of the United States of America. Also, they are Brown people.

[loinburger]

I keep wanting to start a "Labia Infelix" crappycat but I don't know what "infelix" means