A MintPress News analysis found that in a single week Fox News, The New York Times, The Washington Post, CNN, and MSNBC ran almost 1,300 separate stories on the Ukraine invasion, two stories on the Syria attack, one on Somalia, and none at all on the Saudi-led war on Yemen.
by Alan Macleod
Part 3 - Invisible Yemen
In contrast, there was almost no coverage of the latest attacks by Saudi-led forces against Yemen — a campaign that has already created the world’s worst humanitarian crisis, according to the United Nations Refugee Agency. The years-long war has intensified of late, with January 2022 the worst month for civilian casualties since fighting began in 2014.
On February 21, Medecins Sans Frontiers (Doctors Without Borders) reported that the Saudi Coalition bombed targets in Hajjah province in north-western Yemen, killing a number of civilians and injuring far more. Meanwhile, jets pummeled the coastal city of Hodeida. The next day, airstrikes and missiles hit residential areas in the provinces of al-Jawf, Marib, Taizz and Saada provinces.
On February 21, Medecins Sans Frontiers (Doctors Without Borders) reported that the Saudi Coalition bombed targets in Hajjah province in north-western Yemen, killing a number of civilians and injuring far more. Meanwhile, jets pummeled the coastal city of Hodeida. The next day, airstrikes and missiles hit residential areas in the provinces of al-Jawf, Marib, Taizz and Saada provinces.
On February 24, the day of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Yemen was hit by 37 separate airstrikes across the country, primarily in Hajjah and al-Bayda. The next day, the Saudi Coalition also shelled Saada using heavy artillery, killing at least six civilians. Saada has been a center of the bloodshed for some time now. In January, the Saudis dropped a Raytheon laser-guided bomb on a detention center there, killing 91 people and wounding hundreds more.
This is just a taste of the violence, information about which is not easy to come by in the West. In a 24-hour period between Thursday and Friday, the Coalition is accused of violating the ceasefire agreement on 147 different occasions and locations.
These latest attacks were not covered at all by Fox News, CNN, The New York Times, The Washington Post or MSNBC. Yemen has never been a war that has interested American media. Indeed, on MSNBC, there has been more in-depth coverage of Ukraine in one week than of the Yemen conflict since it began in 2014.
This is just a taste of the violence, information about which is not easy to come by in the West. In a 24-hour period between Thursday and Friday, the Coalition is accused of violating the ceasefire agreement on 147 different occasions and locations.
These latest attacks were not covered at all by Fox News, CNN, The New York Times, The Washington Post or MSNBC. Yemen has never been a war that has interested American media. Indeed, on MSNBC, there has been more in-depth coverage of Ukraine in one week than of the Yemen conflict since it began in 2014.
This is despite the fact that hundreds of thousands of people have died, the UN estimating that the death toll reached at least 377,000 by the end of 2021. Furthermore, the United States is a direct participant in the violence. A recent MintPress study revealed that the U.S. has sold at least $28 billion worth of weapons to Saudi Arabia alone, and provides training and support for Riyadh, both militarily and diplomatically, helping the Coalition to continue the bloodshed.
There was some coverage of Yemen in The Washington Post. However, it all centered around Yemeni aggression towards Saudi Arabia and its allies, who were presented as the victims. This included an article on how the U.S. is imposing new sanctions on the so-called “Houthi rebels” and a story about a low-tech drone attack on a Saudi airport, in which it also noted that “Fighting in the strategic city of Marib in past months has led to increased Houthi attacks against Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.” What the Post failed to tell readers is that Marib is not in Saudi Arabia or the UAE, but in Yemen – a fact that undermines the narrative about who is the aggressor. (Inside Yemen, many consider referring to the de facto government as “Houthis” as derogatory and delegitimizing what they see as a coalition of many different groups into the political party Ansar Allah, rather than a Houthi insurgency.)
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