Author: Daniel Larison

Originally appeared on The American Conservative.

The Saudi coalition slaughtered more Yemeni wedding-goers in another massacre today:

First photos of aftermath of #Saudi-led Coalition airstrike on a wedding party today in #Saada north #Yemen.
New update of the casualties:
11 people were killed and 11 injured.
I had to blur 2 photos of children. pic.twitter.com/Oqw73vTAAD

— Ahmad Algohbary (@AhmadAlgohbary) July 3, 2018

This is just the latest wedding massacre carried out by Saudi coalition forces. The coalition has illegally treated all of Saada as a military target for three years, and it has routinely struck civilian targets ever since. U.S. military assistance to the coalition enables attacks like this one, and it has not made coalition attacks any less likely to hit civilian targets. On the contrary, by providing the coalition with unconditional backing for its campaign and refusing to criticize them for their war crimes the U.S. makes attacks on civilians a certainty. There is no excuse for providing weapons and fuel to governments that slaughter people in their homes, schools, markets, and during their wedding celebrations. That support must end, and it is long past time that Congress voted to end it.

Continue reading “Another Saudi Coalition Wedding Massacre in Yemen”

Originally appeared on The American Conservative.

The Trump administration keeps desperately trying to shift the blame for the catastrophe in Yemen away from the Saudi coalition and the U.S.:

#Iran’s support for Houthis in Yemen not only enables attacks on Saudi Arabia & UAE, but also risks increasing Yemen's already massive humanitarian crisis. Ayatollah Khamenei must be held accountable for destabilizing Gulf's security & prolonging suffering of the Yemeni people.

— Secretary Pompeo (@SecPompeo) June 28, 2018

The administration has consistently focused on the small Iranian role in Yemen and exaggerated its importance while doing everything possible to cover for the Saudis and Emiratis at the same time that the U.S. has aided and abetted their bombing campaign and the many war crimes they have committed. Even now that the coalition is launching an offensive on the major port of Hodeidah that serves the vast majority of the population, the U.S. is not calling them out for their destabilizing and destructive activities. Instead of condemning the coalition for putting millions of Yemeni lives in jeopardy, the U.S. helps them to attack their impoverished neighbor. Instead of using its influence with these governments to rein in their abuses and alleviate the civilian population’s suffering, the U.S. gives them carte blanche, never criticizes them even when they massacre wedding-goers and refugees, and goes out of its way to fault one of the few governments in the region that isn’t attacking Yemen for the country’s miserable state.

Continue reading “The War on Yemen and Pompeo’s Pathetic Propaganda”

Originally appeared on The American Conservative.

Philip Gordon and Prem Kumar explain why Kushner’s worthless “peace plan” has no chance of winning Palestinian support:

His administration has offered unconstrained support for settlements, with an ambassador who has fought against use of the word “occupation” and refers to “Judea and Samaria,” as favored by Israeli settlers, instead of traditional U.S. references to the West Bank. It is no surprise, therefore, that the Palestinians stopped talking to the administration. It is hard to see how the United States under Trump will ever be seen as an honest broker, or be able to go around Abbas, when two-thirds of Palestinians oppose the resumption of contacts with U.S. negotiators and 88 percent view the United States as biased in favor of Israel [bold mine-DL].

Reviving negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians would be difficult at the best of times, but it certainly isn’t going to succeed when an openly pro-settler, hard-line American administration is the one behind the effort. The Trump administration’s approach to this conflict is typical of the president’s warped view of diplomacy. He thinks that diplomacy amounts to issuing ultimatums and making threats, and he expects that the other side can be forced into yielding everything if enough pressure is applied. The president has no capacity for empathy with the other side’s position, and it probably wouldn’t matter if he did. Because he doesn’t think it is possible to have a mutually beneficial agreement between two or more parties, he assumes that others have to lose in order for him to get a “good” deal.

Continue reading “A ‘Peace Plan’ That Has Nothing to Do With Peace”

Originally appeared on The American Conservative.

The Trump administration is pressing ahead with its worthless “peace plan” for Israel and Palestine:

Asked by the newspaper’s editor, Walid Abu-Zalaf, about an Abbas spokesman’s dismissal of Mr. Kushner’s trip as a “waste of time” that was “bound to fail,” Mr. Kushner said he believed Palestinian leaders were “saying those things because they are scared we will release our peace plan and the Palestinian people will actually like it.”

There is no chance that Palestinians living in the West Bank and Gaza will like anything the Trump administration has to offer. That shouldn’t have to be said, but I suppose it has to be when the press is talking about this farce of a “peace plan” as if it were a serious proposal. The U.S. has never been an “honest broker” between the Israelis and Palestinians, and Trump has made a point of emphasizing that this administration is extremely biased against the latter. From moving the US embassy to Jerusalem over Palestinian objections to covering for Israeli crimes against protesters in Gaza, the Trump administration has been very clear that it couldn’t care less what any Palestinians think about anything.

Continue reading “A Worthless ‘Peace Plan’ for Israel and Palestine”

Originally appeared on The American Conservative.

The International Rescue Committee dismissed Saudi coalition “relief” plan for Yemen as a public relations gimmick:

The “relief” plan announced by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to protect civilians living in Hodeidah as they attack the port city is a publicity stunt by the Saudi-led coalition (SLC) coalition meant to draw attention away from the undue suffering the attack is causing. The port is absolutely critical to the survival of many innocent Yemenis, and 600,000 civilians living in the port city and surrounding areas are in immediate danger. An attack on or disruption of operations of the port will be catastrophic.

The Saudi coalition’s intervention has been the main cause of the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. The coalition governments pay lip service to providing relief to the civilian population only as a means to deflect attention from the collective punishment and atrocities that it has inflicted on them for more than three years. They are attempting to do so again by pretending that their assault on Hodeidah benefits the people of Yemen when it is sure to cause more death, suffering, displacement, and starvation. If the coalition were even slightly concerned with alleviating the suffering of Yemen’s civilian population, they would halt their current offensive, lift their blockade, and cease their indiscriminate bombing campaign.

Continue reading “‘Relief Plan’ Issued By Saudi Arabia Is a Gimmick”

Originally appeared on The American Conservative.

Trump announced that he is ordering the creation of a “Space Force” as a new branch of the military. Among other problems with this proposal is that creating a new branch is entirely unnecessary:

But the idea has faced resistance from senior Pentagon officials. Last fall, Rogers and Coopers’ proposal was scrapped after Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson and Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. David L. Goldfein said it would lead to unnecessary costs and bureaucracy.

“I oppose the creation of a new military service and additional organizational layers at a time when we are focused on reducing overhead and integrating joint warfighting functions,” Mattis said in October in a memo to Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Continue reading “The US Doesn’t Need a ‘Space Force’”